People

Kamak Ebadi is a robotics technologist who currently serves as a member of the Aerial and Orbital Image Analysis group. He is a member of the Mars2020 Sampling and Catching (SNC) tactical and strategic operations team, which is responsible for commanding the Perseverance rover to collect and store a carefully curated set of rock and soil samples that will be brought back to Earth in the future. Apart from his contributions to the Perseverance rover mission, Kamak is also deeply involved in the development of high-precision orbital maps and Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN) algorithms for guided descent and precise landing on Mars, in support of NASA's Mars Sample Return mission, as well as missions to the moon as part of the NASA Artemis program.

In 2017, Kamak became a doctoral research fellow at JPL, where he worked on a range of cutting-edge research projects while completing his Ph.D. thesis. During this time, he was involved in several notable projects, including collaborative localization and mapping with a team of Mars rover-helicopter, the DARPA Subterranean Challenge, and the simultaneous estimation of the shape and pose of uncooperative space objects.