Dynamic Systems, Control, and Robotics: nonlinear control theory, theoretical kinematics and their applications in mechanical engineering.

Professor Paden received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from UC Berkeley in 1985 and is currently a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara in the Mechanical Engineering Department with a joint appointment in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department. His research interests focus on nonlinear control theory and its application to electromechanical systems. He was a visiting fellow at the Department of Mathematics at the University of Western Australia in 1988. In 1993, he won the Best Paper Award from the ASME Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control and the IEEE Control System Society Technology Award in 2001. In 2002, he was a distinguished foreign visitor and plenary speaker at the Brazilian Control Conference - the largest control conference in South America. An additional conference award is the 2001 James Yorke Red Sock Award given at the SIAM Conference on Applications of Dynamical Systems for his work on experimental chaos. He has consulted for industry on the design and control of magnetic bearings, design of medical devices, and has served as an associate editor for the Journal of Robotic Systems. He is co-founder and president of LaunchPoint Technologies - a systems firm specializing in venture engineering. He has 17 patents and is a Fellow of the IEEE and the AIMBE.

Awards and Honors:

• 2007 AIMBE Fellow
• 2004 IEEE Fellow
• 2002 Distinguished Foreign Visitor and Plenary Speaker, Brazilian Control Conference
• 2001 IEEE Control System Society Technology Award
• 2001 James Yorke Red Sock Award, SIAM Conference on Applications of Dynamical Systems
• 1993 Best Paper Award, ASME Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control
• 1988 Visiting Fellow, Dept of Mathematics, University of Western Australia
• 1983 General Electric Faculty Development Fellowship
• 1976 General Motors Scholarship