inControl: the first podcast on control theory!

The first episode breaks the ice with a bit of the pre-history of control theory. We discuss three iconic ancestors of the science of feedback, including water clocks developed by Ktesibios, the earliest known thermostat,  and governors, a class of mechanical devices,  which,  without exaggeration, have enabled the first industrial Revolution in Britain.

The second episode features an interview with Florian Dörfler, who is an Associate Professor at the Automatic Control Laboratory at ETH Zürich, Switzerland.  We discuss several topics, including his personal research trajectory, the influence of machine learning on control, future challenges in control theory, among others.

Ben Recht is our guest in the third episode. Ben is a Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley.  We discuss several topics, including his research trajectory, Ben's tour of reinforcement learning, and his passion for music, among others. 

More episodes will follow soon!