Sharan Nayak

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About

Sharan Nayak is a pioneering researcher in autonomous multi-robot systems for space exploration, whose work is shaping the future of planetary surface missions. His primary research areas include multi-robot motion planning, heuristic-guided navigation, and cooperative exploration under extreme environmental constraints. Nayak’s most significant contribution is a novel heuristic-guided dynamical multi-rover motion planning framework, which solves the complex problem of coordinating multiple mobile agents to visit designated sites while accounting for real-time dynamics and terrain challenges—a critical capability for upcoming NASA missions. This work, published in 2023, has already garnered 15 citations, reflecting its immediate impact on the field. More recently, Nayak has been instrumental in developing the multi-robot exploration strategy for the CADRE (Cooperative Autonomous Distributed Robotic Exploration) mission, a flagship project aimed at deploying a team of small rovers to autonomously map lunar or Martian surfaces. His 2025 paper on this topic, with 8 citations, demonstrates his continued leadership in translating theoretical frameworks into mission-ready solutions. Nayak’s research not only advances the state of the art in swarm robotics but also directly enables safer, more efficient, and scalable exploration of other worlds.