Tracie Conn

"Planet Earth: You are a crew."
—Christina Koch, NASA Astronaut

Contact

trconn@mtu.edu
(906) 487-1854
R.L. Smith 825

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Assistant Teaching Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

PhD, Aerospace Engineering, The University of Texas at Arlington
BS, Aerospace Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin

Biography

Tracie Conn’s experience spans both academia and industry. Prior to joining Michigan Tech, she gained teaching experience at The University of Texas at Arlington, where she earned her Ph.D. Most recently, she served as Principal Investigator for a National Science Foundation Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project focused on reinforcement learning approaches for autonomous spacecraft guidance and control.

Her professional background includes technical roles at NASA Ames Research Center, NASA Johnson Space Center, and Ford Motor Company. At Ford, she contributed to the development of BlueCruise, a hands-free driving feature, through research on sensor fusion and path planning algorithms. At NASA Ames, she worked on control and simulation methods for small satellite swarm mission concepts. At Johnson Space Center, she worked in the International Space Station Mission Evaluation Room, monitoring hardware performance, providing real-time anomaly resolution, and supporting the on-orbit crew’s maintenance tasks.

Research Interests

Developing AI-based methods for spacecraft trajectory design and maneuver planning
Improving automated driving features on automotive platforms with limited sensors and compute

Areas of Expertise

Small spacecraft mission design
Level 2 Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS)

Publications

Dono Perez, A., Plice, L., Mueting, J., Conn, T., Ho, M., “Propulsion Trade Studies for Spacecraft Swarm Mission Design,” IEEE Aerospace Conference, Big Sky, MT, Mar 2018.
Conn, T., Bookbinder, J., “A Small Spacecraft Swarm Deployment and Stationkeeping Strategy for Sun-Earth L1 Halo Orbits (Poster),” 231st American Astronomical Society Meeting, Washington, D.C., Jan 2018.
Conn, T., Dono Perez, A., Plice, L., Ho, M., “Operating Small Sat Swarms as a Single Entity: Introducing SODA,” 31st Annual AIAA/USU Conference on Small Satellites, Logan, UT, Aug 2017.
Conn, T., “A Framework for Employing Femtosatellites in Planetary Science Missions, Including a Proposed Mission Concept for Titan,” The University of Texas at Arlington, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, 2016.
Perez, T., Subbarao, K., “A Survey of Current Femtosatellite Designs, Technologies, and Mission Concepts,” The Journal of Small Satellites (JoSS), Vol. 05, No. 03, Oct 2016.
Perez, T., Subbarao, K., “Orbit Determination of Femtosatellites used in Planetary Exploration Missions,” 30th Annual AIAA/USU Conference on Small Satellites, Logan, UT, Aug 2016.
Perez, T., Subbarao, K., “A Miniature Satellite Mission Case Study: Observation of Titan’s Dynamic Ionosphere,” AIAA SPACE 2015 Conference and Exposition, Pasadena, CA, Sep 2015.
Perez, T., Rondeau, T., McCarthy, N., “Open-source Forward Error Correction using GNU Radio,” AIAA SPACE 2015 Conference and Exposition, Pasadena, CA, Sep 2015.
Harris, R., Kamte, N., Perez, T., et al., “A Reference Design for the Radionavigation of Femtosatellites,” 27th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of The Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS+2014), Tampa, FL, Sep 2014, pp. 1720-1737.
Perez, T., Harris, R., “Design of Telemetry Link for Direct Communication between Femtosatellites in Low Earth Orbit and Earth Ground Stations,” 32nd AIAA International Communications Satellite Systems Conference, San Diego, CA, 2014.
Harris, R., Conn, T., Gaussiran, T., et al., “The GPSTk: New Features, Applications, and Changes,” ION GNSS Conference, 2007.
Harris, R., Craddock, T., Conn, T., et al., “Open Signals, Open Software: Two Years of Collaborative Analysis using the GPS Toolkit,” ION GNSS Conference, 2006.

Patent(s)

Patent No.US 11,091,280 B1: Modelling and analyzing inter-satellite relative motion, Issued August 17, 2021