Welcome to the REAL lab!
Meet our members: students, researchers, and teachers
Teachers and supervisors
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Academic supervisors
Any researcher from an institution affiliated with the NCCR Automation is eligible to supervise projects at REAL. Visit the NCCR Automation website to see the full list of people involved.
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Claudia Fischer, initiator and coordinator
Claudia has a Dr. sc. in automatic control and almost a decade of experience working in industry.
The one thing she loves more than control systems are intriguing stories and good presentations. That is why she has started REAL.
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Cara Koepele, alumna and teacher
Cara was a member of our spring 2024 master students cohort, exploring how to coordinate multi-energy properties to enable reduced energy costs. Now she is a PhD student at IfA at ETH and has joined our REAL teaching team.
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Jan Brändle, alumnus and teacher
Jan joined REAL in its very first cohort as a master student. Now a PhD candidate at ETH’s Power Systems Laboratory, he remains engaged with the REAL community and enjoys sharing his experience with the next generation of students.
NCCR Automation researchers
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Pulkit Nahata
Pulkit leads the Grid2050 initiative at NCCR Automation, so your lights stay on in 2050.
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Matteo Penlington
Matteo is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He is studying how structured guidance influences the decision-making capabilities of autonomous systems.
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Zhiyu He
Zhiyu is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He is studying the interaction between decision-makers and uncertain environments.
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Marcell Bartos
Marcell is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He is working on facilitating the modular design of online and adaptive control algorithms.
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Fabian Böhm
Fabian is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He aims to prepare the electricity grid for large-scale integration of renewable energy.
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Panagiotis Grontas
Panagiotis is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He wants to balance studying and the joys of life. At least in theory.
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Jonas Matt
Jonas is a doctoral researcher at NCCR Automation. He devises a game plan for the future of power grids.
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Robert Fonod
Robert is a doctoral researcher at EPFL. He developed Geo-trax, a toolbox for extracting georeferenced vehicle trajectories from drone videos.
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Muhammad Zakwan
Zak is a researcher with Inspire AG. He developed SIMBa, a high-accuracy system identification toolbox.
Master students
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Marco Muttoni
Marco is part of our Autumn 2025 cohort. He is co-founding Elenir to make the decarbonization of industries profitable by exploiting their flexibility.
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Giacomo Matroddi
Giacomo is part of our Autumn 2025 cohort. He is co-founding Elenir to make the decarbonization of industries profitable by exploiting their flexibility.
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Sven
Sven is a master’s student of the fall 2025 cohort. He wants to deflate your electricity bill.
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Samuel Renggli
Samuel is a member of the fall 2025 cohort. He uses photovoltaic systems to improve the performance of the electric power grid, even when the sun is not shining.
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Salma Elfeki
Salma is a member of our Spring 2025 cohort. She explores how control systems can learn to adapt quickly to new situations using meta-learning techniques.
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Zheyu Wu
Zheyu is a member of our spring 2025 cohort. He studies how to make robust decisions under uncertainty.
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Yannick Schüpbach
Yannick is a member of our spring 2025 cohort. In collaboration with EWZ, he is optimizing battery storage solutions paired with a Run-of-River power plant.
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Michelle Egger
Michelle is part of our Spring 2025 cohort. She is searching for influencers in social networks.
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Ioannis Papadopoulos
Ioannis is part of our spring 2025 cohort. He works with Swissgrid to develop algorithms that detect early warning signs of power grid instability.
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Boxuan Yao
Boxuan is a member of our spring 2025 cohort. She studies how to integrate users’ behavior into flexibility quantification.
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Nicholas Behr
Nicholas is a master’s student in the Spring 2025 cohort. He wants to keep machines safe without killing their curiosity.
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Patrick Oberlin
Patrick is a member of our fall 2024 cohort. He is applying control theory to optimise curling strategies.
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Seraina Wurster
Seraina is helping SBB to make quantitative decisions when balancing climate goals and technical requirements in battery-electric train.
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Junan Lin
Junan is a member of our fall 2024 cohort. He studies how to leverage long-term planning solutions to improve short-term planning.
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Caroline Gärtner
Caro is a member of our fall 2024 cohort. Her research interests are in robust control using SoS optimisation.
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Emma Laub
Emma is a member of our fall 2024 cohort. She wants to design sustainable electricity grids that do not compromise on reliability.
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Anastasis Vlachos
Anastasis is a member of our fall 2024 cohort. He studies how to track moving targets under real-life constraints.
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Jonathan Hilberg
Jonathan is a member of our spring 2024 cohort. He is teaching autonomous systems to handle risks.
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Philippe Brigger
Philippe is a member of our spring 2024 cohort. He wants to make sure you never get stuck in traffic again.
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Raul Cruz-Oliver
Raul is a member of our spring 2024 cohort. He is giving robots a sense of touch.
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Anne-Laure Matthijs
Anne-Laure is a member of our spring 2024 cohort. Her research interests are in energy systems to help fight climate change.
Lab spaces
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REAL at ETH Zurich
REAL at ETH Zurich started in fall 2024 and is running in two parallel cohorts, one for students working on their master’s thesis and one for researchers of the NCCR Automation.
New cohorts start every March and October. Ping us if you are interested in joining!
Our REAL space is located at the ETH Zentrum campus in the ETL building.
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REAL at EPFL
REAL at EPFL launched in January 2026 with a first cohort of researchers. Stay tuned for their explainers!
Acknowledgements
The idea for REAL was inspired by Jonathan and the golden lamp posts on Polyterrasse. It took shape with the strong support of the NCCR Automation directorate and management team. It owes its beauty and style to Silvio and its liveliness to the researchers and students. Thank you all for your contributions!