Dr. Marco Ciarcià received his M.S. degree (magna cum laude) in Aerospace Engineering from Università degli Studi di Palermo, Italy in 2001. In 2008 he completed his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering at Rice University, Houston, Texas. From 2010 to 2015 he worked as a research associate at the Spacecraft Robotics Laboratory of the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA. He was appointed, from 2016 to 2023, as Assistant Professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department at South Dakota State University, Brookings, South Dakota. From 2021 he has been a member of the AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control Technical Committee. He is also the CTO and co-founder of AeroFly LLC, a UAV design and development company. His research interests include robotics, mechatronics, UAV design, optimal and nonlinear control, spacecraft guidance, navigation and control, and small satellites.