News

The Aviation Week Network recently announced the winners of this year’s 20 Twenties Award. WNCG student Hailey Nichols was among the students chosen for the class of 2022.

WNCG student Hailey Nichols won first place in the Graduate/Postdoc category at last month’s Female Founder Pitch competition. The event was hosted by the Kendra Scott Women’s Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute and the Texas Innovation Center.

WNCG student Lakshay Narula received the Walter R. Fried Memorial Award for Best Paper at the 2020 IEEE/ION PLANSx Conference. The award recognizes “substantial contribution to the technology of navigation and positioning equipment, systems, or practices” judged on criteria including technical content, innovation, importance of topic, and writing quality. Narula’s winning paper, “Automotive-Radar-Based 50-cm Urban Positioning,” demonstrated how self-driving cars can use commercially-available, low-cost automotive radars to improve navigation.

Research done by WNCG alum Matthew Murrian was featured on the cover of the InsideGNSS January/February 2020 volume. Murrian, the lead author on the paper, conducted the work along with Lakshay Narula and Radionavigation Lab director Prof. Todd Humphreys. In 2017, the Radionavigation lab placed a custom software-defined receiver onboard the International Space Station as part of a larger effort to study GNSS signals in the low Earth orbit environment. Over a two-year period, the researchers analyzed data from the receiver and identified multiple sources of GNSS interference.

WNCG faculty member Todd Humphreys has received a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Humphreys was one of five faculty members from The University of Texas at Austin to receive the award for 2019. The PECASE is the “highest honor bestowed by the United States Government to outstanding scientists and engineers who are beginning their independent research careers and who show exceptional promise for leadership in science and technology.”

Manassas Virginia, January 28, 2015 - The Institute of Navigation (ION) presented its Thomas L. Thurlow Award to Dr. Todd Humphreys at the ION International Technical Meeting (ITM)in Dana Point, California, January 26-28, 2015. Dr. Humphreys was recognized for contributions that enhance radionavigation security and robustness in the face of intentional spoofing and natural interference.

By Andrew Roush, originally featured in the Alcalde.  The drone revolution isn’t coming—it’s already here. Can UT expertise help us navigate the future?