Mahmoud Ali

Teaching

Autonomous Robotics — ENGR 599 (Teaching Assistant) Fall 2023
IU Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, Indiana University
  • Robot modeling: Dubins car model.
  • Robot control: PID and LQR.
  • ROS: introduction to the Robot Operating System.
  • Path planning: Probabilistic Road Map (PRM) and Rapidly-exploring Random Tree (RRT).
Robot Software Practicals — RO47003 (Teaching Assistant) Fall 2019 & 2020
TU Delft, Faculty of Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineering
  • Linux: desktop and terminal — OS architecture, file system, shell, and scripting.
  • Git/GitLab: basic workflows, resolving code conflicts, merging partners’ work, issue tracking, and peer code review.
  • C++: introduction to C++, common compilation tools, classes and objects.
  • ROS: using existing ROS tools and developing/testing ROS-based components in C++ with a physics simulator.
  • OpenCV / PCL: integrating OpenCV and Point Cloud Library functionality into new software components.

Volunteering

IU-Luddy Precollege Summer Camp — Instructor 2024–2025

Led robot simulation and demonstration sessions for precollege students.

Arab Robotics & ROS Meetup — Speaker

Invited talk: “Advances in Autonomous Racing.”

Menoufia IDC RoboCon Community — Co-founding Member 2014–2016

Taught and supervised undergraduate students in robotics.

Menoufia ABU RoboCon Club — Member 2012–2013

Designed, built, and programmed robots for local competitions.

Robotics competitions

Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC) 2023–2025
  • Laguna Seca road-course race: 4th place with an average speed of 109 MPH (Jul 2025). (Radar/Lidar Perception Lead)
  • Las Vegas CES race: 3rd place in the time-trial-style competition at 163 MPH (Jan 2025). (Radar/Lidar Perception Lead)
  • Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) race: reached a top speed of 130 MPH (Sep 2024). (Technical Co-Lead)
  • Simulation races: competed in three IAC sim races, securing 4th of 18 teams in the first race (Dec 2023). (Technical Co-Lead)
International IDC RoboCon — Bangkok, Thailand · Team Supervisor 2016

Caregiver theme. Designed two robots to fill pillboxes for elder care — one climbs the shelves and the other collects the pills.

International IDC RoboCon — Rabat, Morocco · Team Member 2014

Great Harvest theme. Designed two robots to collect and sort fruit.

National ABU RoboCon — Cairo, Egypt · Team Member 2013

Green Planet theme. Designed two robots to distribute artificial plants across different locations.