Niklas Schmid
Niklas Schmid
Ph.D. Student
Automatic Control Laboratory (IfA), ETH Zürich
Supervisors: Prof. John Lygeros, Prof. Tobias Sutter
Contact: nikschmid@ethz.ch
Physikstrasse 3, ETL K12, 8092 Zürich, Switzerland
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Summary
I am a Ph.D. student at the Automatic Control Laboratory at ETH Zürich under the supervision of Professor John Lygeros and Professor Tobias Sutter. My research focuses on the control of stochastic systems under safety constraints, which includes the analysis of reachability, invariance, and chance-constrained optimal control problems. Therefore, I utilize tools from dynamic programming and convex optimization.
News
01.03.2025: I am starting a 6-month research visit at Professor Chuchu Fan's group at REALM, MIT!
11.02.2025: Our paper "Computing Optimal Joint Chance Constrained Control Policies" was accepted for publication in the Transactions of Automatic Control (TAC)! Publisher Link
06.02.2025: Daniel Böhler was awarded the best Bachelor Thesis 2024 by the Swiss Control Association (Schweizer Gesellschaft für Automatik)!
03.07.2024: Exciting, interdisciplinary collaboration on "Stopping Power and Range Estimations in Proton Therapy based on Promp Gamma Timing". Results can be found here.
13.05.2024: Our paper "Joint Chance Constrained Optimal Control via Linear Programming" has been accepted for publication in the IEEE Control Systems Letters (LCSS)! Publisher Link
Biography
2025
Research visit at REALM, MIT (Cambridge, USA); Visiting Professor Chuchu Fan's group to work on stochastic control hierarchies
Since Nov 2021
Ph.D. at the Automatic Control Laboratory at ETH Zürich (Zürich, Switzerland); Supervisors: Prof. John Lygeros, Prof. Tobias Sutter
2020 - 2021
Internship at Olympus Surgical Technologies Europe (Berlin, Germany); Control of electrosurgical generators and modelling of tissue impedance
2019 - 2021
M.Sc. in Medical Engineering Science at University of Lübeck, (Lübeck, Germany); Thesis: Gaussian Process based MPC of Tethered Quadcopters
2016 - 2019
B.Sc. in Medical Engineering Science at University of Lübeck, (Lübeck, Germany); Thesis: Cooperative Localization of Quadcopters using Factor Graphs
Publications
All of my publications are available as open-access on Arxiv!
Preprint
J. Miller, N. Schmid, M. Tacchi, D. Henrion, R. S. Smith, "Peak Time-Windowed Risk Estimation of Stochastic Processes", Arxiv, 2024, Arxiv-Link.
Y. Li, A. Karapetyan, N. Schmid, J. Lygeros, K. H. Johansson and J. Martensson, "Parallel Rollout for Deterministic Optimal Control", Arxiv, 2023, Arxiv-Link.
Journal
N. Schmid, M. Fochesato, S.H.Q. Li, T. Sutter and J. Lygeros, "Computing Optimal Joint Chance Constrained Control Policies", IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control (2025). Arxiv-Link, Publisher-Link.
J. F. Werner, F. Pennazio, N. Schmid, E. Fiorina, D. Bersani, P. Cerello, J. Kasprzak, N. Mosco, S. Ranjbar, R. Sacchi, V. Ferrero and M. Rafecas, "Stopping Power and Range Estimations in Proton Therapy based on Prompt Gamma Timing: Motion Models and Automated Parameter Optimization", Physics in Medicine & Biology, 2024. Publisher-Link.
N. Schmid, M. Fochesato, T. Sutter and J. Lygeros, "Joint Chance Constrained Optimal Control via Linear Programming", IEEE Control Systems Letters, 2024. Arxiv-Link, Publisher-Link.
Conference
J. Miller, N. Schmid, M. Tacchi, D. Henrion, R. S. Smith, "Peak Time-Windowed Mean Estimation using Convex Optimization", 2024 IEEE 63rd Conference on Decision and Control (CDC), Milano, Italy, 2024, Arxiv-Link.
N. Schmid and J. Lygeros, "Probabilistic Reachability and Invariance Computation of Stochastic Systems using Linear Programming", 22nd IFAC World Congress, Yokohama, Japan, 2023. Arxiv-Link, Publisher-Link.
J. Gruner, N. Schmid, G. Männel, J. Grasshof, H. S. Abbas and P. Rostalski, "Recursively Feasible Model Predictive Control using Latent Force Models Applied to Disturbed Quadcopters", 2022 IEEE 61st Conference on Decision and Control (CDC), Cancun, Mexico, 2022. Publisher-Link.
N. Schmid, J. Gruner, H. S. Abbas and P. Rostalski, "A real-time GP based MPC for quadcopters with unknown disturbances", 2022 American Control Conference (ACC), Atlanta, USA, 2022. Arxiv-Link, Publisher-Link.
Teaching
Teaching has a high priority for me. I believe that it is our responsibility to share our fascination and knowledge to inspire future generations of students in the same way that it has been shared with us.
Courses
Fall 2024/23: Assisting the Control Systems lecture by Prof. Florian Dörfler.
Spring 2024: Assisting the Nonlinear Systems and Control Lecture lecture by Dr. Eduardo Gallestey and Dr. Raffaele Soloperto.
Spring 2022 - Fall 2023: Organization of our lab’s General Laboratory (hands-on course for students to explore control theory in a learning-by-doing fashion on actual physical systems).
Fall 2018 - Spring 2021: Design and presentation of practical and theoretical exercise sessions for an electronics lecture by Prof. Philipp Rostalski at the University of Lübeck.
Fall 2018: Supervision of students in practical exercise sessions on radioactivity.
Student Projects
I usually have several open student projects available. Feel free to contact me at any time if you are looking for a Bachelor-, Semester-, or Master-project based around control theory and hands-on applications.
Completed Thesis Projects:
Name Title Type Year Co-Supervisors
Salma Elfeki High-Performance MPC Controllers Under Environmental Changes MT 2025 Riccardo Zuliani
Rye Gleason Optimal Crop Fertilization Control Strategies and Verification MT 2025 Kevin Wallington
Tristan Zeller Joint Chance Constrained Reinforcement Learning SP 2025 Marta Fochesato
Daniel Böhler Iterative Learning Control for Plants in Controlled Environments SP 2025 Kevin Wallington
Jair Reyes Optimal Control of Plants in Controlled Environments SP 2025 Kevin Wallington
Nicola Scagnetti Design and Control of a Hydroponics System MT 2025
Jonathan Hilberg Model Free Joint Chance Constrained Optimal Control MT 2024 Marta Fochesato
Andrey Kharitenko Robust Covariance Steering MT 2024 Marta Fochesato, Anastasios Tsiamis
Simon Dreher Redesign of an Hydroponics System SP 2024
Ariel Bergmann Control of an Inverted Pendulum BT 2024
Alexander Kaspar Meta-Learning Model Predictive Control for the Ball-On-A-Plate System SP 2024 Jiaqi Yan, Riccardo Zuliani
Mirco Vandeventer Meta-Learning Reinforcement Learning for the Ball-On-A-Plate System SP 2024 Jiaqi Yan
Simon Frölich Hardware Reconfiguration and Control of the Ball-On-A-Plate System BT 2024
Gian-Andrin Coolen Hydroponics - Mechanics BT 2024
Oscar Kläsi Hydroponics - Electronics BT 2024
Leo Noth Hydroponics - Sensing and Control BT 2024
Daniel Böhler* Hydroponics - Software Design and Control BT 2024
Alexander Kaspar MPC of the Mounted-Helicopter Experiment BT 2023
Elias Bai Improved Reinforcement Learning Control of the Ball-On-A-Plate System BT 2023
Joram Ebinger LQR and Reinforcement Learning Control of a Ball-On-A-Plate System BT 2023
Gentrit Gashi Water-Level Sensing for the Quad-Tank Experiment BT 2023
BT: Bachelor Thesis, SP: Semester Project, MT: Master Thesis.
*Awarded Best Bachelor Thesis 2024 by the Swiss Control Association (Schweizer Gesellschaft für Automatik).
Grants & Funding
85.735 CHF funding by the KIM (Commission of Computer Science, ETH Zürich) for designing a hands-on control class using cart-pole systems, 2024.
20.000 CHF funding by the NCCR Automation, Swiss National Science Foundation, for my research visit at MIT, Boston, USA, 2024.
ACC (American Control Conference) Student Travel Grant 2022.
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