Stamatina Barakou is an R&D Engineer and a Ph.D. candidate in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the National Technical University of Athens in the Intelligent Robotics and Automation Laboratory (IRAL), under the supervision of A.Professor Costas Tzafestas. She holds a Production Engineering and Management Diploma (5 years) from the Technical University of Crete and a Master's degree in Robotics from the National Technical University of Athens. She is a teaching assistant in IRAL and has also worked at mobile and aerial robotics companies. Her doctoral research focuses on multi-robot platform aerial manipulation — specifically on how multiple drones equipped with robotic arms of different degrees-of-freedom can work together to manipulate objects that are too heavy or too large for a single drone to handle. A direct application of such a 'multi-drone system' is to deliver emergency supplies to inaccessible areas after a natural disaster, or to assemble structures at construction sites, capable of assisting humans in demanding scenarios. The challenges are substantial: sophisticated control algorithms, real-time communication, and robust systems that can adapt to dynamic environments. A comprehensive analysis was published as an article in the peer-reviewed journal MDPI Drones in 2024.

As a Fulbright Visiting Research Student, Stamatina will spend a 6-month period at the University of Denver in the Unmanned Systems Research Institute of the School of Engineering and Computer Science, under the supervision of Professor Kimon Valavanis. During this period, she will bridge the gap from theory to real-life implementation; advancing from complete theoretical model development of this multidisciplinary field to practical, deployment-ready demonstrations, making significant contributions to the field and therefore benefiting society nationally and globally.