Hello! I’m Darshit Patel, a Robotics Software Engineer currently working in the Engineering Development Group at MathWorks, where I contribute to the development of simulation and control tools like Simscape Multibody and Simulink Test. I hold a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Virginia Tech, where my research focused on motion planning and nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) for autonomous vehicles navigating complex environments.
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My core interests lie in building intelligent, adaptable robotic systems that can operate reliably in dynamic real-world conditions. I’ve worked on projects involving probabilistic motion planning, trajectory optimization, and visual SLAM, and have deployed algorithms on both scaled AV platforms and full-size vehicles. I enjoy working at the intersection of planning, control, and perception, and have also explored integrating machine learning models, like Gaussian Processes, into traditional robotics pipelines.
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Outside of robotics, I’m an endurance runner and a lifelong learner who enjoys staying connected to emerging trends in AI, autonomous systems, and simulation technologies. I believe in the power of well-tested, robust robotics to make a meaningful impact across industries—from mobility and logistics to research and beyond.
Contact: +1 540-824-0814 | dapatel2198@gmail.com
EXPERIENCE
July 2023 - Present
Full-Time
MATHWORKS Inc. | Engineering Development Group​
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Working with the Simscape Multibody team to develop the Simscape Multibody Toolbox. Majorly working on full feature development (Design, Implementation and Unit Testing) for enhancing the toolbox. Using C++ to develop and unit test the features. Worked on development of various force blocks and joint blocks in the Simscape multibody library
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Contributed to the Computer Vision and Automated Driving Toolbox team to develop a VSLAM feature for breaking down every image in the database to Bag of Words. This improved the efficiency of loop closure in the VSLAM applications
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Developed a demo to use Extremum Seeking Control for Battery State of Charge Estimation using the Control Systems Toolbox and Simscape Battery.
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Also serving part time as an Application Support Engineer to help Simulink and other MathWorks Engineering products' users with Technical issues regarding the usage of the products. This role provides me opportunities to show leadership while working in a collaborative environment. I contribute as a Tech Coach or Operations Lead to lead the Support Team tackle customers' technical issues. Developed a thorough understanding of Simulink and other engineering products like Simscape, Robotics Toolbox, Requirements Toolbox etc.
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Developing tools using Salesforce API to maintain and update Knowledge Articles on the internal Salesforce website
May 2022 - August 2022
Engineering Development Group Intern
MATHWORKS Inc. | Stateflow Semantics team
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Developed a feature to convert Stateflow graphs to Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAGs) for error analysis, and implemented error detection using the new feature.
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Created a C++ based class for DFS traversal of Stateflow models, leveraging the Visitor Pattern Design to extract graph properties
August 2021 - May 2022
August 2022 - May 2023
Graduate Teaching Assistant (Part-Time)
VIRGINIA TECH | Mechanical Engineering Department
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GTA for Sophomore level course ME2004 - Engineering Analysis and Numerical Methods for three semesters.
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Conducted MATLAB in-class exercise lectures, weekly recitation sessions, weekly MATLAB doubt-solving sessions, setting-up assignments/quizzes, and grading assignments/quizzes.
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GTA for Junior level course ME3414 - Fluid Dynamics Lab.
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My responsibilities include setting-up apparatus for the experiments, supervising the lab sessions and helping the students if needed, and grading of the lab reports
May 2019 - August 2019
Mitacs Research Intern
UNIVERSITY OF GUELPH, CANADA
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Worked on a Passive Battery Thermal Management System for Electric Vehicles by embedding Li-ion cells into high porosity metal foam.
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Analyzed the heat transfer rate and temperature uniformity of the battery pack.
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Click here for more details about the project.
June 2018 - July 2018
Production Intern
LARSEN & TOUBRO, HAZIRA, INDIA
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Worked as a product engineer at the Modular Fabrication Facility of L&T Hydrocarbon Engineering, Hazira Manufacturing Complex, Surat. The project I assisted on was the fabrication of pressure vessel for IOCL Bongaigaon.
EDUCATION
August 2021-May 2023
Master of Science (GPA - 3.95/4.0)
VIRGINIA TECH | MECHANICAL ENGINEERING​
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Research at Automotive Systems and Intelligent Machines (ASIM) lab under the supervision of Prof. Azim Eskandarian. My research includes Motion Planning for self-driving vehicles and V2V communication of connected vehicles
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Coursework: Optimization Techniques In Engineering (ME 5794); Advanced Machine Learning (ECE 5424); Computer Vision (ECE 5554); Nonlinear Systems Theory (ME 5994); Adaptive Control Systems (ME 6574); Applied Linear Systems (ME 5554); Robotics & Automation (ME 5704)
July 2016-June 2020
Bachelor of Technology (GPA 9.37/10)
SARDAR VALLABHBHAI NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY | MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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Obtained a major rank of 12 out of 231 students in the Mechanical Engineering batch of 2020.
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Relevant Coursework: Fundamentals of Computer & Programming, IC Engine & Automobile Engineering, Automobile Engineering, Dynamics of Machine, Tribology & Machine Dynamics, Machine Design - I & II, Mechatronics, Thermodynamics, Fluid Mechanics, Mathematics - Linear Algebra, Vector Calculus, Numerical Techniques.
July 2014-June 2016
Gujarat State Higher Education Board
T&TV Sarvajanik High School
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Obtained first rank in High School amongst Math major students of High school.
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Scored 99.78 percentile rank amongst all the Math major students of Gujarat State.
PUBLICATIONS
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Darshit Patel, Azim Eskandarian, 2024, “Sampling-Based Planning Algorithms At Non-Signalized Intersections With Traffic For Autonomous Vehicles,” to be submitted to IEEE journal of Transactions on Intelligent Vehicles
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Darshit Patel, Azim Eskandarian, "Probabilistic RRT Connect with intermediate goal selection for online planning of autonomous vehicles," arXiv:2305.08080
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Shathushan Sivashangaran, Darshit Patel, Azim Eskandarian, "Nonlinear Model Predictive Control for Optimal Motion Planning in Autonomous Race Cars"; IFAC-PapersOnLine, 55(37), pp. 645–650. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ifacol.2022.11.255
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Goodarz Mehr*, Prasenjit Ghorai, Ce Zhang, Anshul Nayak, Darshit Patel, Shathushan Sivashangaran, and Azim Eskandarian, "X-CAR: An Experimental Vehicle Platform for Connected Autonomy Research," in IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Magazine, doi: 10.1109/MITS.2022.3168801.
PROJECTS & RESEARCH
Motion Planning of Self-Driving Cars Aug 2021-May 2023
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Conducted research at the ASIM lab under the advice of Prof. Azim Eskandarian at Virginia Tech, VA.
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Implemented different sampling-based path planning algorithms for self-driving vehicles at an unsignalized intersection using MATLAB programming. Implementing and comparing RRT, RRT*, Informed RRT* and probabilistic RRT (pRRT).
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The gif embedded herewith shows one of the crossing scenarios with the pRRT algorithm.
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Compared the algorithms for various scenarios involving multiple obstacle vehicles and multiple lanes.
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Improved the baseline pRRT model for online replanning in complex scenarios with faster execution time.
ASIMcars and Autonomous vehicle Aug 2021-May 2023
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I contributed to the research at the Autonomous Systems and Intelligent Machines (ASIM) lab at Virginia Tech University which is headed by Prof. Azim Eskandarian.
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Built a full-scale autonomous vehicle using CARMA platform for experimentations and data collections of Vision systems, Motion Planning algorithms, and control of connected vehicles. Paper can be viewed here: https://doi.org/10.1109/MITS.2022.3168801
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Worked on small scaled autonomous vehicle robot to test and implement motion planning algorithms. The paper can be found here: https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2212.01691
Trajectory planning for autonomous racing using Non-Linear Model Predictive Control March 2022-April 2022
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Developed a system using NMPC toolbox in MATLAB for generating time-optimal trajectory for a racecar for a known track.
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Used the parameters of 3 different classes of racecars (F1, LMP1, LMGTE) to develop a non-linear dynamic bicycle model to define the dynamics of the vehicle.
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Used Track data for various F1 circuits to map the track and obtain the optimal trajectory for each of the three vehicle classes for comparison.
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Conference paper accepted at MECC 2022 to be presented in October 2022. Paper can be viewed here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ifacol.2022.11.255
Electric Go-Kart | Team Phoenix Racing July 2018 - Feb 2019
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As a part of our college's FSAE team, we developed an electric go-kart and participated in the 6th Electric Go-kart Design Challenge held at India's premier F1 track, "The Buddh International Circuit" in February 2019.
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I was responsible for the design of vehicle dynamic systems (steering system, wheel hubs, and the weight distribution) of the kart, 3D modeling of various vehicle components using Solidworks, thermal analysis of battery pack, and the structural analysis of wheel hubs. I was also responsible for maintaining the treasury of the team and hence make a cost-report for the kart.
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The autocross and skidpad events being the tests for suspension and steering systems, I was extremely satisfied when we obtained first position in both the events.
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This was the first time our team entered an electric vehicle design competition and we won 7 different awards at the competition including the title of Champions of E-GKDC 2019 in our first attempt at the competition.
Battery Thermal Management System May 2019 - August 2019
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I got an opportunity to work as a Globalink Research intern and work at the Heat and Mass transfer lab under the supervision of Prof. Shohel Mahmud at University of Guelph, ON, Canada in the summer of 2019.
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I performed the battery discharge test at different discharge rates to obtain the temperature plot at the surface of a single Li-Ion cell.
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This study can be used to calibrate simulated batteries working as a substitute for the real cell, as working with Li-ion batteries can be dangerous.
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I created a passive system using porous media to study the heat dissipation through the embedded simulated battery cells. I tested 5different samples of porous media with varying pore densities and porosities studied the effects of these porous media parameters on heat dissipation by observing the Ra-Nu variation for heating and cooling cycles at 5 different discharge rates.
Air Shock-Absorber | Capstone project August 2019 - May 2020
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As my undergraduate capstone project, I worked on development of an air shock-absorber for two wheeled vehicles under the guidance of Prof. Hemant Nagarsheth.
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This project aims to use atmospheric air instead of compressed air for damping the oscillation of a suspension system.
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I developed the 3D model of the system and the quarter-car model of the proposed system and tested it on the Simulink environment.
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Due to Covid-19 outbreak, the experimentation of the system could not be completed and hence only the simulation study was submitted as the capstone project.
Lane detection
As a start to image processing and perception for self-driving cars, I implemented a lane-detection algorithm using OpenCV library in python3. Click on the project name for a link to the Github repository.
MPC control
I developed python codes for the lane change maneuver using PID control and the Model Predictive Control. I used the kinematic bicycle model for the dynamics and the Linear Time-Invariant system for the PID and MPC control. I observed the difference in tuning of control parameters and oscillatory response between PID and MPC techniques.
SLAM using Kalman Filter
As a part of a Coursera project, I implemented an error-state Kalman Filter for state-estimation and localization of a self-driving cars using LIDAR, IMU and GPS measurements. I also implemented basic least square estimator, linear Kalman filter and an extended Kalman filter using python.
Line-Following Robot
Made a Line-following robot using IR sensor arrays and Atmega32 microcontroller for detection of white line on a black background. Incorporated a weighted sensor algorithm for tracking the white line.
Won a line-following robot contest in our freshmen year at our college level.
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All-terrain robot
In my freshmen year, I made a simple wired robot with a gripper mechanism to complete various manual tasks including moving balls from one place to other via a rough terrain. The bot reached the final stage of an all-terrain vehicle contest.
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Indicator Mechanism
Designed an indicator mechanism using a pantograph linkage and spring-pulley assembly to trace an enlarged (distinguishable) P-V curve of an IC engine
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SKILLS
Software skills
C++ (Modern C++11/14); Simulink; MATLAB; Python 3 - Keras, Tensorflow, OpenCV; Robot Operating System; Linux systems; JIRA; git; CARLA; REST API; SolidWorks; AutoCAD; CREO
Core Competencies
Robotic Motion Control, Robot Motion Planning, Vehicle Dynamics, Mechatronic System Integration, System Validation & Testing, Model Predictive Control (MPC), Trajectory Optimization
Additional
​Real-Time Systems, Computer Vision (Object Detection), System Integration, V2V Communication
LEADERSHIP
Mentoring Chair | Mechanical Engineering Graduate Students' Council (MEGSC)
August 2022 - May 2023
Working as a mentoring chair for MEGSC. My task is to oversee the peer-mentoring program for ME grad students where we pair up first year grad students with existing grad students for guidance and advice. Organized various social events for gathering all the mentors and mentees for better connections.
ADVISOR | Student Research Council
Sept 2019-May 2020
I worked as an advisor in the Research and Affairs Council which was a part of the student body and I was responsible to assist the student research secretary. During our tenure, we successfully started a student research magazine, a student project funding scheme, and various technical talks/workshops for developing extra skills in students necessary for research and industries.
TREASURER | SAE Student Chapter
May 2018-May 2019
I worked as a treasurer for our college's SAE student chapter that houses FSAE team, Aero-modeling team, and Battle Bots teams. Prepared budget at the start of the year to secure funds from the Institute. Worked to get third-party sponsors to fund the teams.
CO-HEAD | Cutting Edge Visionaries
July 2018-May 2019
I worked as a co-head for a non-technical student club which was responsible for organizing professional CEV talks(like TED talks), weekly debates and group discussions for getting the overview of students on world affairs.
MOOCS, CERTIFICATIONS & TRAININGS
Self-driving Cars
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Completed "Introduction to Self Driving Cars", by University of Toronto on Coursera.
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Completed "State Estimation and Localization of Self-Driving Cars" by University of Toronto on Coursera.
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Ongoing "Motion Planning for Self-driving cars", by University of Toronto on Coursera.
Programming, ML and Deep Learning
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Completed "Deep Learning & Neural Networks", by Deeplearning.ai on Coursera.
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Completed "Machine Leaning using Python", by IBM on Coursera.
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Completed "Introduction to MATLAB programming" by Vanderbilt University on Coursera.
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Ongoing "Object Oriented Data Structures in C++" by UIUC on Coursera.
IC Engine and Motorbike Engineering workshop
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In the winter of 2017, I took part in an 80 hour intensive internship cum training program on IC Engine and Vehicle Dynamics of motorbikes.
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As a part of this internship, we designed the specifications for a 2 door sports coupe with emission control features, where we learned about the costing of car components, benchmarking techniques and the latest vehicle technologies.
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I obtained an award for being the best intern amongst 80 participants of the program.
Miscellaneous courses & workshops
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Completed "Applied Control Systems for Engineers" on Udemy.
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Attended a 2-day "Vehicle Dynamics & Vehicular Design Workshop" by the owner of NB Technologies, Mr. Ravindra Kolhe.