People

Imon Chakraborty

Assistant Professor

Dr. Imon Chakraborty (Ee-mon Chalk-row-boar-tea) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Auburn University. He joined Auburn in Fall 2018, and prior to that worked as a Research Engineer at Georgia Tech’s School of Aerospace Engineering. He received his PhD (2015) and Master of Science (2011) degrees in Aerospace Engineering from Georgia Tech and his Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech) degree in Mechanical Engineering from National Institute of Technology Tiruchirappalli, India (2009). He hails from the city of Kolkata in India. He is a Senior Member of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and an Associate Member of its Aircraft Design Technical Committee. Dr. Chakraborty is an active Private Pilot, and flies or has flown the Cessna 152, Cessna 172, Diamond DA20, and Piper Cherokee/Warrior aircraft.

Tristan Macke

Undergraduate Student

Tristan Macke is a Junior in Aerospace engineering at Auburn University. Tristan is from Birmingham, Alabama. He began his undergraduate career in August 2016. He has gained experience with detailed design with his work with AIAA’s Design Build Fly competition on behalf of Auburn University. He has been a part of the team for three years and became Co-Captain in 2018. Though Design Build Fly, Tristan has experience regarding Computer aided design and producing hardware for those systems. After graduation, Tristan plans to pursue employment with an Aerospace engineering company, specifically working with spacecraft. At VSD2L, Tristan is currently working on designing the layout of a cockpit flight simulator setup to be established soon in the Gavin Building.

Omkar Mulekar

Undergraduate Student

Omkar Mulekar is a Senior in Aerospace Engineering at Auburn University. Omkar hails from Mobile, Alabama. He began his undergraduate career in August 2015. He gained experience on guidance, navigation, and controls and spacecraft dynamics while working on a team designing the Attitude Control System of an NSF Funded 6U CubeSat mission and while interning at Johnson Space Center working on the development of Launch Abort Simulations for SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Capsule. He is involved with an Engineers Without Borders irrigation project in the Bolivian Andes Mountains and has travelled twice to Quesimpuco, Bolivia on assessment and implementation trips.
After graduation, Omkar plans to pursue a PhD in Aerospace Engineering to specialize in the dynamics and controls of aircraft and spacecraft. At VSD2L, Omkar is currently working on developing a modular and flexible 6-degree-of-freedom flight simulation model based in MATLAB/Simulink and linked with FlightGear.

Grant Hawkins

Undergraduate Student

Grant Hawkins is a Sophomore in Mechanical Engineering at Auburn University. He is from Dallas, Texas and began his undergraduate career in August 2017. In high school, he was involved in the NASA High School Aerospace Scholars Program, during which he worked with NASA engineers at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. He began his studies at Auburn as an Aerospace Engineering student. This year, he made the switch to Mechanical Engineering and plans to pursue a Pre-Med track as well. Grant is working in Dr. Chakraborty's lab as an undergrad seeking to gain research experience working alongside other graduate and undergraduate researchers. After graduation, Grant plans to attend Medical School and pursue a career as a Medical Doctor. At VSD2L, Grant is currently working on parametric geometry definition of vehicle designs and harmonizing said definition across different analysis and visualization tools.