Bio: Michael McPartland is a Technical Staff member in the Air Traffic Control Systems Group at MIT Lincoln Laboratory. He received his BS, MS, and PhD degrees in Aerospace Engineering from SUNY Buffalo. Michael leads research in the areas of NextGen capabilities such as 4D-Trajectory Based Operations (4D-TBO) and the effects of weather information on these capabilities as well as on UAS autonomy. He is a member of RTCA SC-206, Meteorological Data Link Services, and former sub-group co-chair on Wind Guidance. Prior to joining MIT Lincoln Laboratory, he has had appointments at George Washington University and Harvard Medical School. He has worked in the aerospace industry in the DoD and GA sectors, including as a lead software engineer producing a variety of certified avionics.Additional areas of work at the Laboratory include directing and developing the creation of high-fidelity distributed simulators. This includes the modeling and simulation of commercial aircraft, avionics, pilots, weather, and weather forecast systems as well as visually-immersive simulators of aircraft control towers. With these systems, we explored and analyzed various goals and concepts of the FAA's Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen). He has developed and deployed a distributed, virtualized and clustered simulation system encompassing accurate models of commercial aircraft, flight management systems (FMS), autopilot & autothrottle systems, etc. for analysis of temporal performance of aircraft in a 4D-TBO environment.Recently he has been leading the development and is the principal investigator of PADWOS, the portable aircraft derived weather observations system. PADWOS is a Mode S transponder interrogation system that extracts data from nearby aircraft and can generate wind and temperature estimates aloft. This NOAA funded effort is currently authorized by the FAA and FCC to operate in the National Aerospace System as a prototype.

MDM Consultancy provided project design, management and delivery of software components for both embedded and PC applications. MDM Consultancy maintained a superstar team of systems and software engineers skilled in the development and deployment of safety critical embedded C/C++ systems as well as in the development .NET PC applications.

Group leader producing primary flight display and other avionic products for piston and small jet aircraft. Architect level software development and project lead, developing real-time graphics, subsystems, autopilot controls, etc., of DO-178B Level-B flight critical software. Known for solving difficult problems quickly and elegantly. Considered "Go-to" engineer for just about anything software and electrically related. Dedicated champion of writing clear testable requirements and establishing traceability amongst code, requirements, and tests. Practiced flight test engineer.

Directed and conducted the design and development of advanced embedded systems of class II medical devices. Designed electrical, software, and communication architectures. Programmed extensive real-time control and communication algorithms on DSPs and MCUs. Developed graphical user interfaces for Windows CE systems (C++). Modeled and simulated system and control dynamics. Designed and produced multiple PCB schematics of modular systems incorporating data acquisition, motor control, microprocessors, LCDs and other embedded components. Participated in mechanical design. Performed new product cost containment, design controls and failure mode and effect analyses (FMEAs). Used multidisciplinary skills to foster improved business relationships among R&D groups and various non-technical corporate sectors such as marketing and sales. Leveraged off of medical and biomedical background to clearly and effectively communicate with customers to identify solutions to user needs.

Responsible for developing advanced software and hardware for SensAble’s primary product, the FreeForm Modeling system, a 3D modeling package which utilizes an advanced robotic human-machine interface device. Using C++, designed and developed extensive OO code for numerical methods applied to new mathematical approaches for NURBS fitting and manipulation to voxel and point-cloud data, GUIs, Windows NT/2k device drivers, haptic constraints, generic class libraries, control algorithms and much more. Performed rapid prototyping of complex algorithms and "blue-sky" application enhancements. Participated in full software product life cycle processes in a fast-paced user driven environment. Wrote host code and embedded microprocessor firmware for servo control and USB communications. Designed, constructed, and tested electrical circuitry for controlling next product line of multi axis robotic interface devices and servo motor control systems.

Developed methods to quantitatively assess and model dynamic postural stability of astronauts after extended periods of space flight and of patients with vestibular and other balance disorders. Developed testing protocols and conducted human experiments. Wrote journal articles and abstracts. Delivered presentations of findings and co-authored renewal grants. Shared findings with other NSBRI collaborators and developed a postural stability testing technique to be employed by Johnson Space Center investigators for astronaut pre- and post-flight physiological testing.

Created innovative target processing algorithms and enhanced control subsystems of complex real-time video processing and tracking system on Cobra Ball surveillance aircraft using Matlab and C++. Wrote Matlab to C++ math libraries for mission critical applications on embedded systems.

Established at GWU their first program in biomechanics and instructed authored graduate-level courses. Biomechanics I introduced students to muscular and skeletal anatomy as well as human motor control. Advanced Biomechanics introduced students to the modeling of mechanical properties of biological tissues and incorporated laboratory sessions in tissue testing. The advanced class was specifically orientated towards preparation of whole-limb, whole-body finite element modeling.

PI and Project Manager for multiple modeling, simulation, and embedded controls projects predominantly concerned with vibration and noise suppression, signal processing, control algorithm development, system testing and verification for application to Navy turboprop aircraft. PI responsibilities included design and fabrication of mechanical testing apparatuses, low-level data acquisition and real-time control software development and the creation of elaborate mathematical models and simulations of systems based on test results in Matlab and Simulink. Managerial responsibilities included marketing, proposal writing, budgeting and scheduling of multiple projects, preparing and presenting briefs, dealing directly with customers and contracting officers as well as overseeing engineers and technicians on staff. Designed, constructed, and integrated both electrical and mechanical sub-systems including sensors, actuators, power amplifiers, computer controllers, and mechanical hardware.