A Penn State aerospace engineering professor is getting a major boost from NASA to help make spacecraft smarter, more autonomous, and more reliable.

Roshan Eapen, an assistant professor of aerospace engineering, was named one of the seven recipients of NASA’s 2025 Early Career Faculty Award. The award will provide Eapen with $677,267 over three years to fund his research.

The NASA Early Career Faculty program supports university researchers whose work aligns with the agency’s space technology and exploration goals. Eapen was one of seven faculty members selected for the 2025 cohort from institutions across the country.

Eapen’s project, called HJ-PRISM, focuses on helping spacecraft make important decisions on their own instead of relying on constant instructions from Earth.

The project will combine machine learning with physics-based models to create what Eapen describes as a “decision map.” The goal is for spacecraft to use that system to determine efficient maneuvers, identify unexpected situations, and change their behavior when necessary.

Rather than depending entirely on artificial intelligence that can be difficult to understand, Eapen’s approach connects machine-learning decisions to the physical laws that govern a spacecraft.

Eapen’s goal is to combine the reliability of traditional physics-based methods with the flexibility of machine learning.

The research falls under one of NASA’s Early Career Faculty topics focused on using machine learning to improve guidance, navigation, and control decisions made aboard spacecraft.

The three-year award will also allow Eapen to build a larger research program at Penn State centered around trustworthy spacecraft autonomy. Part of the funding will support graduate students while the team develops algorithms and software for the project.

Eventually, Eapen hopes to move the research beyond the mathematical foundation and into practical testing. The team plans to evaluate the system in realistic spacecraft scenarios before experimenting with embedded computing and hardware-in-the-loop demonstrations.

Eapen feels that the award is “humbling and encouraging” and is the foundation for a long-term research program.

The award also gives Penn State students an opportunity to work alongside Eapen on research combining mathematics, machine learning, and future space exploration.