Biography
Dr. Ayoubi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Santa Clara University. He graduated from the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Purdue University. His general areas of expertise are multibody dynamics, nonlinear, optimal, and intelligent control of aerospace vehicles. His research is focused on spacecraft dynamics and control. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), a senior member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a senior member of the American Astronautical Society (AAS), and a member of the AIAA Intelligent Systems Technical Committee. He is also an Associate Editor of the AIAA Journal of Spacecraft and Rockets and the ASME Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control.
Biography
Ph.D., Purdue University, 1989. AIAA (Associate Fellow). NASA Ames Research Center (ARC) Aviation Management Office (AMO) Chief Engineer. Lead engineering effort in preparing NASA missions involving flight assets to achieve airworthiness certification. Research Interests: aircraft composite materials, loads development, linear and nonlinear analysis, and damage tolerance.
Nik Djordjevic
Adjunct Lecturer
Biography
Mr. Djordjevic has been on the faculty of the Mechanical Engineering Department at Santa Clara University as an Adjunct Lecturer since 2010. He teaches undergraduate and graduate classes in Heat Transfer, Fluid Dynamics, Thermodynamics, Thermal System Design, Propulsion, Aerospace Engineering, and Systems Engineering.
Between 1983 and 2012 he was with Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, most recently as a Manager of the Aerodynamics, Fluid Mechanics and Performance group in the Engineering Department. His prior assignments include a Manager of the Design Guidance group, and a Space Technology Project Engineer on the NASA Space Station program, responsible for all thermal, structural, mass properties, and chemical contamination design analyses under the Lockheed Martin WP-01 contract. He was a Mission Operations lead engineer during the launch and deployment of two communication satellites under contract to the U.S. Air Force. He was a member of the management team overseeing the merger of Lockheed and Martin Marietta Corporations’ spacecraft lines of business during the mid-1990s. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Mr. Djordjevic helped develop a comprehensive set of engineering processes covering all aspects of the space business at Lockheed Martin. He was a recipient of multiple programs and individual awards and recognitions, and a patent disclosure award for cryogenic freezing of biological tissue on the International Space Station.
Prior to coming to Lockheed Martin, Mr. Djordjevic worked for Rockwell International’s Rocketdyne Division in Canoga Park, CA, where he designed the data instrumentation system for the Solar One power plant in Barstow, California. He also collaborated on the design of the next-generation expander liquid rocket engines. At Aerojet Liquid Rocket Company in Sacramento, CA, he worked on the re-design of the Space Shuttle’s Orbital Maneuvering System rocket engines.
Mr. Djordjevic has been, since 1998, adjunct faculty in the Mechanical Engineering Department and the Aerospace Engineering Department at San Jose State University and was an Associate Faculty in Engineering at West Valley College in Saratoga, CA, from 1991 to 2013.
Mr. Djordjevic graduated from UCLA School of Engineering and Applied Sciences with a BS (1976) an MS (1978) in Engineering, and a PhD candidacy (Equivalent to the Engineer Degree) (1982).
Drazen Fabris
Associate Professor
Biography
Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, 1996. Research Interests: Nanoscale Heat Generation and Transport, Electronics Cooling, Energy, Computational, Analytical, and Experimental Fluid Mechanics
Biography
Dr. Ian Johnson joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Santa Clara University as a lecturer in 2024. He graduated from the University of Washington in 2015 where his research focused on integrating an alternative propellant Pulsed Plasma Thruster into the High-Power Helicon Thruster Experiment. Ian is currently a Principal Engineer at Maxar Space Systems in Palo Alto, where he leads the propulsion team for the Psyche mission with JPL, the OSAM-1 mission with NASA Goddard, and the Lunar Artemis Gateway Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) with NASA Glenn, in addition to supporting numerous geostationary communication spacecraft for commercial customers. He has research and industry experience with both electric and chemical propulsion subsystems.
Areas of Expertise
Propulsion Systems
Mark Lopez
Adjunct Lecturer
Biography
Ph.D., Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016. AIAA (Member) and Vertical Flight Society (Member). U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation and Missile Center, Subject Matter Expert for Flight Dynamics Modeling. Research Interest: Flight Dynamics Modeling for Fixed Wing and Rotary Wing Vehicles, High Fidelity Physics-Based Modeling, System Identification, Manned Aviation and Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS).
Nhan Nguyen
Adjunct Lecturer
Biography
Dr. Nhan Nguyen received a Ph.D. degree from Santa Clara University in mechanical engineering, an M.S. degree from Stanford University in mechanical engineering, and two B.S. degrees from California State University-Chico in applied mathematics and mechanical engineering. He is a senior research scientist at NASA Ames Research Center with 35 years of experience. He is the technical group leader of the Advanced Control and Evolvable Systems group in the Intelligent Systems Division where he leads a group of 24 researchers to advocate for research funding in guidance, navigation, and control. His technical expertise includes adaptive control theory, optimal control theory, distributed control theory, aircraft flight dynamics and control, aerodynamics, and aeroelasticity.
Dr. Nhan Nguyen publishes over 250 technical publications and one textbook “Model-Reference Adaptive Control – A Primer” with Springer publisher. He holds 6 U.S. patents and two patents pending as the primary inventor. He received numerous prestigious NASA honors and awards including the “NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal” and two NASA Ames awards for “Excellence in Engineer Category.” He was elected and served as the chair of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Intelligent Systems Technical Committee during 2015-2017. He received the “AIAA Distinguished Service Award.” He gave numerous talks including an invited keynote talk in Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany organized by the German Aerospace Center DLR.