Soft mobile robots offer distinct advantages for navigating complex terrains because of their inherent flexibility, which enables exceptional adaptability and versatility. However, their compliant bodies introduce significant challenges, such as motion uncertainties and unpredictable interactions with their environment, that are difficult to control. Furthermore, the complex dynamics of soft mobile robots complicate the realisation of full autonomy, a challenge that is further exacerbated by the limited sensing and proprioception capabilities employed in the field.

This thesis aims to advance the field of autonomous origami-enabled mobile robots, a subclass of soft mobile robots, by enhancing their capability to traverse complex terrains and improving their viability for real-world applications. Previous work from the Bio-inspired Adaptive Morphology Laboratory (BAM Lab) developed an Origami-Enabled Soft Crawling Autonomous Robot (OSCAR) in pursuit of this goal. OSCAR is a novel soft mobile robot that leverages origami-inspired mechanisms to mimic the crawling motion of caterpillars. Hence, building upon that foundation, this work enhances OSCAR’s capabilities by enabling traversal of complex three-dimensional spaces without relying on external sensors, paving the way for implementation of truly autonomous navigation.

OSCAR’s mechanical stability is first enhanced with a double-celled design, and vertical actuation is introduced by employing four origami towers per cell. These upgrades improve stability, maneuverability, and locomotion range, enabling complex three-dimensional terrain traversal in the updated version called the Slinky Origami-Enabled Soft Crawling Autonomous Robot (SOSCAR). Afterwards, control systems are developed to realise the new mechanical design and demonstrate vertical obstacle avoidance. Finally, internal sensing mechanisms, using Time-of-Flight distance sensors and Inertial Measurement Units, are integrated to provide proprioception, or self-awareness, that enable closed-loop positional feedback control. Whereas previous versions of OSCAR relied on external sensors for control, all sensing in SOSCAR is fully integrated onboard the robot.

Ultimately, this thesis presents a soft mobile robot that integrates the necessary elements for future implementation of autonomous navigation in complex three-dimensional terrains. As a result, it advances the real-world readiness of origami-enabled robots and highlights their potential for operating in challenging environments.

The International Moth is a small racing sailboat that can reach top speeds of 35 knots (18 m/s), due to its use of hydrofoils, which lift the entire hull clear of the free surface. The hydrofoils replace the hull as the primary generators of hydrodynamic forces within the vessel system, and in turn, heavily drive the overall performance of the vessel. Optimizing the shape and planform of the foils is a key to achieving race-winning designs. However, hydrofoiling sailboats are highly coupled systems that operate in two simultaneous fluid media, and a change in foil configuration can have cascading effects on the overall vessel state. Thus, a design framework is formulated that allows foil designs to be evaluated within a 6 degree of freedom velocity prediction program (VPP). The framework integrates gradient-based shape optimization tools in 2 and 3 dimensions. Evaluation of the framework demonstrates functionality for design optimization independent of the VPP, but the presented approach to modeling hydrodynamic forces within the VPP requires improvement in order to produce meaningful results that can inform design decisions.

Decarbonizing Brazil is crucial for reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. To that end, the Net-Zero Brazil (NZB) modeling study aims to provide viable pathways for the country to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. The modeling will be done with unprecedented spatial, technological, and temporal resolution. It relies on a least-cost, multi-sector optimization model being developed by the Princeton ZERO Lab called MACRO. Given Brazil’s prominence in biofuels and land-use challenges, a strategic approach to bioenergy deployment is essential. My study presents a high-resolution bioenergy supply chain optimization model, Downscale, designed to integrate into NZB to determine cost-effective bioenergy production, processing, and distribution pathways at fine spatial, temporal, and technological resolutions. A key feature is its downscaling capability, which enhances MACRO by translating state-level energy system results into actionable strategies for local deployment. Downscale is a mixed-integer linear programming model that optimally locates bioenergy crops, conversion facilities, and transportation while incorporating economic, environmental, and land-use constraints within municipalities. It is a myopic optimization model with no look-ahead, called at every time step of MACRO optimization. Cost-supply data for biomass resources and techno-economic characteristics of a portfolio of conversion technologies were gathered at the municipality-level (5570 municipalities in Brazil) for future use in MACRO via state-level aggregation. Downscale was then tested for Mato Grosso do Sul, a key biofuel-producing state. Four scenarios were analyzed: uniform demand growth for bio-derived energy carriers, low environmental protection (allowing bioenergy crop production in the Pantanal region), modest electrification of energy demands, and high electrification of demands. Results indicate that strategic infrastructure expansion can meet rising bioenergy demands while minimizing costs and environmental impacts, while also highlighting trade-offs in land-use decisions and resource allocation. This model provides actionable insights for policymakers and investors while serving as both an enhancement to MACRO and NZB and a standalone tool for downscaling optimization problems.

Technology is ever-evolving, and its usefulness in sports training applications has increased with each evolution. Coaches and teams turn to technology to analyze player movements, break down game footage, and improve athletic performance. The sport of ice hockey has seen rapid player development over its history, with the game becoming faster, player equipment constantly improving, and the sport more popular and accessible than ever [4]. However, despite the abundance of training technology available for ice hockey players, one position still lags behind in development: the goalie. Ice hockey goalies often develop at a slower pace than their skater teammates due to a lack of expert coaching and resources at the lower levels, as well as the specialized equipment required, which makes the position more expensive and creates barriers to entry [19]. Additionally, goalies see the most growth in their playing ability when they get meaningful ice and game time. This thesis explores various designs of automated ball pitching and launching machines, as well as previous attempts to develop hockey puck shooting machines for goalie training. It also investigates why these earlier designs failed to gain widespread adoption within the goalie training community. Drawing on these insights and market research conducted for this project, the goal of this senior thesis is to design and build a functional puck launcher that is portable, versatile in capability, and can operate both on and off the ice, while being easily transported between different training locations.

This thesis explores the design and simulation of a control system that would enable omnicopter drones to simulate close proximity spacecraft rendezvous maneuvers. Close proximity rendezvous simulations typically exist either as simplified online models that lack real-world dynamics or as prohibitively expensive physical testbeds. By leveraging the six degrees of freedom (6-DOF) capability of omnicopters—drones with non-planar rotor configurations allowing complete spatial movement developed by Dario Brescianini and Raffaello D’Andrea—this research provides a cost-effective middle ground between purely digital and full-scale physical simulations. The study implements relative orbital motion using the Clohessy-Wiltshire equations to model the dynamics between a ”chief” and ”deputy” omnicopter, simulating target and approaching spacecraft respectively in close proximity operations. A cascaded control architecture that separately handles attitude and position control enables the simulated deputy omnicopter to approach and maintain specific poses relative to the chief within small distances, mirroring the final critical phase of spacecraft rendezvous. Using MATLAB, the research validates this control strategy through simulation, demonstrating its effectiveness for precise close proximity maneuvers. This work’s contributions lie in: (1) implementing close proximity orbital rendezvous control for omnicopters in simulation, (2) providing improved documentation of omnicopter capabilities to address gaps in publicly available resources, and (3) establishing a foundation for future physical implementation and testing. While physical deployment remains outside the scope of this thesis, the comprehensive modeling and simulation work presented here creates a viable pathway between theoretical spacecraft dynamics and accessible hardware implementation for future research in close proximity operations.

This thesis presents a modular, fuel-optimal framework for autonomous reconfiguration of satellite swarms in low Earth orbit. Built using convex optimization and Clohessy-Wiltshire dynamics, the system enables agents to maneuver into desired formations while minimizing total DeltaV. It supports both centralized and event-triggered control modes, and includes logic for fault-aware role reassignment when agents fail or drift off-nominal. The architecture is designed for extensibility and validated under orbital parameters from NASA’s Starling mission, anchoring the simulations in a realistic mission context.

Beyond idealized dynamics, I extended the framework into a nonlinear regime, incorporating repulsion-based collision avoidance and full orbital propagation. Although early implementations using MATLAB’s fmincon solver failed to resolve hard-constrained formulations, a successful reconfiguration was later achieved through soft-penalized collision avoidance. This final nonlinear simulation demonstrated precise formation change under actuator and safety constraints, revealing tradeoffs between feasibility, fuel cost, and control fairness in high-dimensional swarm settings.

Across eight original simulations, I validated control strategies that are adaptive, resilient, and fuel-efficient—ranging from passive drift modeling to fault-tolerant reconfiguration, perturbed execution, and constrained nonlinear optimization. These simulations, along with the full source code and CVX routines, are publicly released on GitHub at github.com/sabrinanicacio/satellite-swarm-thesis. This thesis delivers one of the first open-source testbeds for mission-relevant satellite swarm reconfiguration using both CW-based convex planning and exploratory nonlinear control.

Together, these contributions provide a practical foundation for future work in large-scale, autonomous satellite maneuvering. By revealing the architecture-level tradeoffs between fuel use, feasibility, and safety enforcement, this project bridges a critical gap between theoretical swarm control and operational flight software.

This thesis focuses on the design of a two-element rear wing with a driver-actuated drag reduction system (DRS) for an electric Formula Student racecar. A physical design space is first defined around Princeton Racing Electric’s MK3 car and brief vehicle dynamics calculations are done to establish a minimum downforce requirement for tested conditions in the Formula Hybrid Electric competition. High-lift, low Reynold’s number airfoils are modified to be compliant with the Formula Hybrid competition rules and analyzed initially in Xfoil. This is followed by two- and three-dimensional CFD analyses using Fidelity Pointwise for meshing and ANSYS Fluent for flow simulation and analysis. These simulations inform the optimal geometric configuration of the two wing elements and endplates to maximize the downforce/drag ratio under the analyzed conditions. The DRS design is informed by further CFD analysis and is implemented as an electromechanical system capable of being switched between high downforce and low drag configurations where needed to achieve the fastest lap times. The final rear wing design is capable of producing 128.5 N of downforce, 96% above the calculated requirement, while reducing drag by 83% when the DRS is activated. The thesis presents a finalized wing geometry with measurements, highlights and discusses general aerodynamic trends, and presents opportunities for further study and improvement on the design.

Fusion has the potential to be a paradigm-shifting energy generation source with the capability to accelerate both the transition to renewable energy and meet growing global demand. Recent advances in the computational optimization of one fusion reactor design, the stellarator, have produced the need for various physical experiments to study their plasmas. However, building a new stellarator is a complex, expensive, and time-consuming process, largely due to the manufacturing challenges of their nonplanar magnetic field coils. As a result, it is cost prohibitive to build multiple stellarator experiments. By reevaluating the coil design, a single experimental machine could be built with the ability to generate the magnetic field of many unique stellarator designs, lowering the investment required to study a range of optimized plasmas. This thesis presents a method of manufacturing a continuous 2D "surface coil" for a stellarator to replace the typical set of discrete coils. To this end, a twelfth torus stellarator coil was built out of Galinstan using a plastic mold. The magnetic flux density at coil currents of 300 and 900 A was measured at 128 distinct points by a set of Hall effect sensors on a custom printed circuit board. Compared with simulation in COMSOL Multiphysics, the measurements in the axial direction of the coil had maximum, median, and mean errors in the Y direction of 47.72%, 12.79%, and 9.51% for 300 A and 18.84%, 3.61% and 4.76% for 900 A. For the other directions, these errors were one to two orders of magnitude higher, likely attributable to the influence of unshielded wires external to the coil. Although the error in the magnetic flux density for a real-world fusion device should be less than one percent, this thesis made a significant step towards demonstrating the feasibility of a 2D "surface coil."

This thesis presents the design and modeling of a self-expanding lunar factory capable of utilizing resources on the Moon to manufacture components for its own growth. A comprehensive system architecture is developed integrating extraction, processing, manufacturing, and assembly subsystems optimized for the lunar environment, with a focus on achieving high resource closure rates while remaining feasible with near-term technologies. An 8,925 kg initial factory configuration is established for further analysis.

A time-step simulation model is implemented to evaluate factory growth dynamics, resource utilization efficiency, and production bottlenecks under various operational scenarios. Using a genetic algorithm to optimize resource allocation strategies, the model demonstrates the initial factory can triple its mass over five years of operation, with 85% of new components manufactured from lunar resources. Key findings reveal that power constraints and processing bottlenecks significantly impact growth trajectories, producing linear rather than exponential growth. Counterintuitively, increased Earth resupply (2,500 kg/yr vs. 500 kg/yr) resulted in not only greater total mass growth (44,491 kg vs. 25,318 kg) but also a higher percentage of lunar-sourced components (71.3% vs. 57.9%).

This work provides insights into production process integration, operational constraints, and growth potential of self-expanding lunar manufacturing, demonstrating how strategic design choices can help establish sustainable industrial capability on the Moon with minimal Earth dependence.

Human space exploration represents the culmination of the best of what our world has to offer—scientific and technological capability walking hand-in-hand with the human drive to explore and understand. Mars, the closest and most similar neighboring planet to Earth, has long been a source of inspiration for both science fiction and scientific advancement. It is the first logical target for investigating the presence of life on other planets and launching an era of interplanetary human existence. Designs for crewed Mars missions have long been tied to development of technology and operational capabilities on and around the Moon, but some of the aerospace community has historically been divided on the role the Moon should play in the development of crewed Mars mission architecture. This thesis explores the viability of executing a crewed mission to Mars without significant prior development of technology and operational capabilities on and around the Moon. Current prominent Mars mission architectures are compared and contrasted, technological and knowledge gaps are identified, and the necessity of the lunar prerequisites is evaluated. This paper compares the mission architectures of Mars Direct, NASA’s Design Reference Architecture 5.0, NASA's System Analysis Cycle 2021, SpaceX’s Starship architecture, and the preliminary architecture discussions of NASA’s Moon to Mars program. Commonalities of the prominent architectures are identified. Sub-architectures are then reviewed, including: entry, descent, and landing systems; ascent systems and in situ resource utilization; life support systems; communication considerations; surface power systems; and crew health and performance. The extent to which the Moon serves as a beneficial "proving ground" for the development of these areas is evaluated and discussed, ultimately determining the extent to which creating a robust, feasible, and safe crewed Mars mission architecture depends on prior development in the lunar domain.

This thesis documents the experimental investigations of thermocapillary motion for an air bubble in 5 cSt silicone oil confined to a cylindrical tube. Thermocapillary motion of a long bubble in a tube is due to an applied temperature difference that results in a surface tension gradient along the surface of the bubble. This surface tension gradient manifests as a thermocapillary stress which causes the bubble to move towards the region of higher temperature. These experiments assume low Reynolds and capillary numbers. The Bond number is on the order of 1, which results in deviation from current literature, where the assumption of a small Bond number is made. Then the Péclet number ranges from 10^-2 to 1, a similar range to other experimental investigations of the thermocapillary effect. This study explores thermocapillary motion of long bubbles for a variety of temperature gradients (β) ranging from 0.4 to 1.5 °C/cm. NTC thermistors in a voltage divider circuit are used to capture temperature measurements along the cylindrical tube. At the same time, photos are taken of the bubble progression to determine bubble position and length. The primary results are the bubble length and velocity over time which can be correlated to average temperature acting on the bubble at a given time step. The capillary number (Ca) and modified capillary number (∆σ^∗) are used to represent the experimental results. These parameters are the dimensionless representation of bubble velocity and temperature gradient respectively. The experimental results of this thesis are compared to that of theory and the order of magnitude for bubble velocity found experimentally is different than expected. The current hypothesis is that small deviations from the fluid regimes of theory result in very large deviations from literature. It is found that for large enough temperature gradients (β > 0.8 °C/cm), the bubble velocity is not constant as is typically seen in literature. Instead, as the bubble migrates towards the hotter region, the bubble begins to accelerate. Results also indicate that the average temperature acting on the bubble and fluid properties have been found to play a larger role in bubble velocity than previously accounted for in literature. Considerations for change in viscosity have been accounted for in the analysis of the data presented in this thesis.

Feather-like control surfaces are shown to increase net lift at post-stall angles of attack, yielding benefits in efficiency and control for small aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Inspired by covert feathers on birds’ wings, ongoing wind tunnel experiments aim to optimize the design and configuration of passively-deployed aeroelastic flaps.

A single-degree-of-freedom model describes the aerodynamic forces on the flap due to the pressure differential over the wing surface, using a combination of analytical and numerical methods. The pressure distribution is integrated for the resulting forces; a user can determine the magnitude of the forces contributing to flap deployment for various locations (leading edge at 0.2 of the chord or trailing edge at 0.7 of the chord) and for distinct angles of attack and flow conditions.

Achieving multi-medium locomotion, especially between water and air, has been difficult for engineers. However, it presents no challenge to nature’s flying fish, who can easily traverse both the sea and the air utilizing the same anatomical structure. Better understanding flying fish anatomy could help unlock hydro-aero locomotion; unfortunately, studying flying fish has proven to be very difficult. They are too fast in water, they cannot be held captive, and their material properties and structure significantly change post-mortem. Princeton’s Bioinspired Adaptive Morphology (BAM) Lab aims to solve the mystery of how and why flying fish fly by studying their structure through an engineering approach: a bioinspired robotic model organism (RMO). A component of biological interest in the flying fish is its asymmetric caudal fin, which is common across all species of flying fish and is not present in many other types. The BAM Lab has studied the effect of the asymmetric caudal fin of the RMO for swimming, which has revealed that an asymmetric caudal fin produces higher thrust and lift than a symmetric one does. One goal of this thesis is to examine the effect of the caudal fin shape in taxiing. To make this possible, this thesis focuses on advancing the RMO to give it the ability to taxi. The design changes to the RMO focused on reducing the overall weight to lower the thrust requirements to exit the water. Due to the lack of stability in free swimming, a new experimental setup was also designed that prescribed the trajectory to a 30 degree exit angle. Using this rig, the design changes proved to be very successful as the new RMO was able to reach taxiing height at a wide range of flapping frequencies, whereas in relative comparison, the original RMO was only barely able to reach taxiing height at very high frequencies. Additionally, further force and moment characterization tests were performed with the new RMO at a 30 degree angle at a submerged and taxiing height with the different fins. The results support previous findings that the asymmetric tail provides higher thrust and lift and likely contributes to the flying fish’s incredible ability to navigate both mediums.

Germany’s goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2045 has accelerated its transition to renewable energy after the previous decade’s push towards a nuclear phase-out, but simultaneously contributed to rising electricity prices and economic strain. The Russian-Ukrainian conflict further exposed vulnerabilities in Germany’s energy system, driving up energy costs and impacting both citizens and the industrial sector. As a result, debate over the role of nuclear power has reignited in political and public discourse. This thesis evaluates the economic feasibility of reactivating decommissioned nuclear power plants using the PyPSADE energy system model. Through the simulation of investment and dispatch scenarios through 2050 across Germany and neighboring countries, this study compares the impacts of nuclear reactivation with continued renewable expansion in terms of cost-effectiveness and CO2 emissions. Results from the model indicate that the reintroduction of nuclear power is too time-consuming and therefore not economically feasible due to the rise of solar and wind power, suggesting the need for additional infrastructure to support the growing renewable energy sector.

The Princeton Field-Reversed Configuration (PFRC) Micro-reactor presents unique neutron shielding and fusion energy capture requirements due to its compact nature. Efficient thermal energy capture and extraction is critical to the implementation of the PFRC. The goal of this project is to design and implement an experimental setup to measure the temperature profile under heating and cooling conditions within a packed pellet bed. This was done by constructing a test set up scaled by pellet diameter with wall heating on one side. Carbon steel pellets of two varying sizes were selected, 3 mm and 7 mm. Each system was heated to steady state and then cooled with a working fluid of compressed air. The energy absorption of the pellet bed during heating developed a deeper understanding for the relationship between bed size and energy capacity. Energy extraction due to air showed the importance a hot outlet flow temperature will play in creating an efficient heat exchanger. The conductivity of the pellet bed will need to be high enough such that a temperature gradient along the direction of wall heating can facilitate heating of the entire incoming flow. This was seen to relate heavily to the void fraction of the respective beds such that as the voidage increases so does conduction within the bed.

The primary objective of this senior thesis is to continue the development of the AgIRoM, focusing on the integration of various planner methods to demonstrate the capabilities of the platform in a live navigation example. AgIRoM is a vision-based quadrotor platform that largely extends upon the work conducted by the Robotics and Perception Group (RPG) at the University of Zurich (UZH) on Agilicious through the addition of a depth-based motion planning pipeline. In particular, the development of AgIRoM was the main focus of my work during the past two years in the Intelligent Robot Motion Lab (IRoM). This report aims to discuss the process of successfully integrating two novel planner methods: the first is a method described in Perceive with Confidence (PwC) developed by researchers in IRoM, and the second is Ego-Planner (and its successor, Ego-Planner Swarm), a lightweight gradient-based planner developed specifically for quadrotors. The project was able to reach the live-testing phase with Perception Guarantees (the name of the GitHub repository of PwC, these terms will be used interchangeably) with some initial success but was unable to conduct full extensive testing due to the deprecation of AgIRoM's state estimation systems (discontinued end-of-life support for the visual-inertial odometry camera, and calibration deterioration for the motion capture system). Consequently, testing for the integration of Ego-Planner was done fully in simulation. During the integration and testing phase, it was found that a majority of the challenges arose from incompatibilities in hardware and their respective proprietary software packages. In an effort to address this, a Zed Mini camera - which has both state estimation tracking and depth estimation capabilities - was tested as a substitute for both cameras onboard the Agilicious framework.

Methanol is an important platform chemical in the chemical, fuel, and polymer industries, which, conventionally, requires energy intensive conditions to produce. Methane partial oxidation to methanol by hydrogen peroxide offers a sustainable alternative which, depending on catalyst design, may occur at milder conditions and enable methanol production from methane at remote locations. This study investigated palladium nanoparticles supported on and encapsulation in MFI as catalysts for hydrogen peroxide decomposition and methane partial oxidation to methanol. Pd-proximal H+ sites were found to decrease rates of hydrogen peroxide decomposition by a factor of 23 for nanoparticles supported in H-MFI compared to amorphous silica. Pd sites were found to be inactive towards MPO by hydrogen peroxide to liquid products at the conditions studied but Pd-free MFI catalysts showed appreciable liquid product formation, with yields and selectivities varying based on cations present in the support. These results demonstrated the promise of bifunctional H- and Na-MFI supported or encapsulated palladium nanoparticles for hydrogen peroxide synthesis and methane partial oxidation to methanol by hydrogen peroxide.

Right now, NASA’s Psyche spacecraft is making history as the first traveler to a metal-rich asteroid, which is also named Psyche! Psyche could be part or all of the iron-rich core of a planetesimal, an early planetary building block, that was stripped of its outer rocky shell as it repeatedly collided with other large bodies during the early formation of the solar system [1]. The objective for this project was to design and build an interactive museum exhibit about asteroid 16-Psyche’s hypothesized magnetic field which is engaging, durable, accessible, and scientifically accurate, for less than $615 and in no more than ten weeks. The exhibit content should focus on the most fundamental and commonly misunderstood parts of the Psyche Magnetometry Investigation. The exhibit should also be free of any safety hazards, specifically to young children who may interact with the display. A two-sided spinning exhibit was rigorously designed and built from wood, acrylic, and PLA, with scientific content split by past and present. Users can interact with the exhibit through a push button on each side which controls LEDs that illuminate magnetic field lines. It was concluded that most design requirements and project objectives were met, including the objectives for safety and scientific accuracy. However, there are still a range possibilities for future work and continued exhibit improvement, such as revising the display text and conducting research to determine the educational effectiveness of the exhibit. Important lessons learned include the importance of purchasing high quality materials from trusted vendors, and the dangers of exceeding a project deadline and/or budget.

Mars exploration is governed by a ruthless mass-ledger: every kilogram of ascent propellant ferried from Earth displaces payload or science return. Laser-ablation propulsion (LAP) addresses this constraint by transferring energy remotely. A laser mounted on a lander or orbiter delivers nanosecond pulses to a small pad on the vehicle; the pad ejects a high-velocity plasma plume, and the recoil produces thrust while the power plant stays off-board. This thesis quantifies LAP performance for the first time under Martian ambient (600 Pa, 210 K CO₂). A coupled thermal–mechanical model implemented in ANSYS Mechanical APDL tracks crater evolution, phase explosion, and impulse generation for polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), carbon-fiber composite, and basaltic/regolith ablators. Parametric sweeps over 1–10 J pulse energy and 50–200 µm spot diameter predict momentum-coupling coefficients up to (4.2 ± 0.3) × 10⁻⁵ N·s·J⁻¹ and specific impulse 900–3200 s. These figures exceed chemical engines in propellant efficiency and encroach on Hall-thruster territory while retaining orders-of-magnitude higher thrust-to-mass because the laser mass is external.

Mission-level scaling indicates a 500 kW orbital fibre-laser can loft a 50 kg sample-return canister to 1.2 km with <15% pad mass, cutting Earth-launch mass by ~30% relative to methane/LOX ascent. Pulses shorter than 20 ns favor plasma-dominated ablation and maximum specific impulse (I_sp); pulses around 50 ns maximize the momentum-coupling coefficient (C_m) for hopper-scale thrust. A hybrid composite–regolith pad is proposed to reconcile coupling efficiency with in-situ manufacturability.

In the future, laboratory validation can be done using a torsional thrust stand and gated schlieren plume imaging, after which computational fluid dynamics can be embedded to capture dusty-gas entrainment. By mapping the material–pulse design space and demonstrating a credible mass advantage, this work positions externally powered LAP as the missing middle ground between high-thrust chemical rockets and high-I_sp electric thrusters—enabling agile surface mobility and lightweight ascent for the next generation of Mars missions.

Flexible, polymer-based wearable sensors have been extensively studied over the past 30 years. Conventional sensors usually consist of a conductive material deposited into or onto a polymer substrate. Laser direct writing (LDW), a more recent innovation, allows conductive graphitic carbon to be directly patterned onto the surface of a polymer sheet, eliminating the need for the addition of a separate conductor. However, there are still ways to further streamline the fabrication process, including the use of LDW to induce formation of the substrate and conductive material simultaneously. This thesis presents a route towards the functionalization of this technique through the laser irradiation of uncured, liquid-phase polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), a thermosetting elastomer. Scanning a near-infrared, continuous wave laser in a grid pattern across the surface of PDMS produces a mesh of conductive, graphitic carbon lines within a matrix of cured, solid polymer. The resulting structure shows potential as a wearable sensor, with a resistance at rest of about 26.9 k$\Omega$. Resistance increases with the application of external forces, and the sensor is able to detect changes in pressure and strain. As a possible avenue toward higher conductivity or graphene content, small concentrations of carbon black were added to uncured PDMS. No conductivity was observed for the resulting grid structures, possibly due to changes in material absorption.