91ÖÆƬ³§

Dr. Cody Karcher joined the 91ÖÆƬ³§ Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department in 2024.  He obtained his PhD from MIT in 2022 in Aeronautics and Astronautics.  Prior to this, he was a Computer Science Research Institute (CSRI) Postdoctoral Fellow at Sandia National Laboratories, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Michigan, and an Associate Technical Staff Member at MIT Lincoln Laboratory.  He completed his BS at the University of Maryland, College Park in 2014.

 

Dr. Karcher's research focuses on helping engineers make better, faster decisions during the course of the design process.  He seeks to uncover underlying mathematical structure in engineering design problems, to develop numerical optimization methods that exploit this structure, and to leverage AI as a tool for advancing optimization-centered design.  Active areas of application include Uncrewed Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), wind and hydrokinetic energy systems, subsonic transport aircraft, rotorcraft, and sustainable aviation.  In addition to his computational activities, Dr. Karcher serves as the Director of the 91ÖÆƬ³§ Low Speed Wind Tunnel.  

 

As an instructor, Dr. Karcher teaches MAE 451: Aircraft Preliminary Design and Performance, MAE 478: Aerospace Systems Design I, MAE 479: Aerospace Systems Design II, and MAE 551: Aircraft Preliminary Design and Optimization.  He is also the advisor for the 91ÖÆƬ³§ Design Build Fly (DBF) Team.