The Cullen College of Engineering had a significant presence at this year’s Italian Research Day in the World 2025, celebrated locally by several organizations, with several professors presenting keynote addresses and serving as poster competition judges.
The Consulate General of Italy in Houston, the Comites of Houston and the West-South Central Chapter of ISSNAF organized a one-day research symposium on May 10 in the TMC3 Collaborative Building in the Helix Park Life Science Complex.
The organizers invited Marzia Cescon, the David C. Zimmerman Assistant Professor of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, and Vittorio Netti, adjunct professor in the Space Architecture program, to deliver a keynote presentation to showcase their research. The presentations were in the session “Spotlight on Emerging Investigators.”
Cescon’s presentation explored automation and autonomy for cyber-physical systems from the perspective of control engineering. She provided application examples derived from the activity of her research group, which spans advanced air mobility, adaptive space systems, and personalized healthcare.
Netti started with an overview of the research conducted at SICSA (Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture) from 1978 to today, to introduce the current research of the laboratory, which focuses on the use of extended reality (XR) for the design and testing of the next generation of orbital and surface space habitats.
In addition to the presentations, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers participated in a poster presentation and competition. Several UH students participated in the poster competition, and three UH faculty members — Cescon, Netti, and Olga Bannova, Research Professor and Director of the Space Architecture Graduate Program — served as judges.
The winning poster was presented by Giuseppe Spallitta, postdoctoral research associate at Rice University. Participating students from the University of Houston included:
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
- Caleb Hairston
- Razi Hamdi
- Lea Prade
- Theodoro Tavoulareas
- Yejin Wi
Civil and Environmental Engineering
- Riccardo Vitale
- Brandon Voelker
- Chiara Di Muro
- Laetitia Tango
- Ankita Vashishtha
- Amin Tavakkoliestahbanati
Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture
- Giacomo D’Amico
For a full listing of this year’s events, visit the Comites Houston website.