Dakota Roberson, Ph.D.

Dakota Roberson is an Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Idaho. He is an Associate of the Center for Advanced Energy Studies where he directs a research team focused on electrical grid security and stability. He is also a Nuclear Engineering Affiliate Faculty and holds a joint appointment with the Idaho National Laboratory in the National and Homeland Security directorate. Professor Roberson is a Senior Technical Advisor to the U.S. Air Force Chief Scientist and a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and he recently served as a White House Fellow at the U.S. Department of Defense and as a member of the Defense Science Board.

His engineering courses include power system stability, automation, estimation/detection theory and advanced classical control. His courses are designed in part to prepare students for careers in critical infrastructure security and modernization. Prior to joining the University of Idaho, he was with Sandia National Laboratories.

Professor Roberson’s current research interests are in demand-side control of distributed assets and aggregation, critical infrastructure security, global energy supply chains, modern concepts of deterrence and cyberweapon nonproliferation. As a member of the DSB, Dr. Roberson studied DoD dependencies on critical infrastructure and new dimensions of conflict, including the use of proxies, resources, foreign aid, infrastructure and state-owned entities for nations to impose their political will. Technological advances, state-based predatory lending, intellectual property theft, and influence/coercion through AI and deepfakes, for example, all present new dimensions of conflict worthy of investigation, as well.

• Council on Foreign Relations Term Member
• Senior Technical Advisor to the U.S. Air Force Chief Scientist
• White House Fellow, 2019-20
• Former Member of the Defense Science Board
• Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
• Member of the IEEE Power and Energy Society
• District Director, Tau Beta Pi (The Engineering Honor Society)

• 2022 Distinguished Under 40 Award, Greater Idaho Falls Chamber of Commerce
• 2022 National Science Foundation Innovation-Corps (NSF I-Corps) award
• Named among the Top Innovators for Cybersecurity Research by Public Utilities Fortnightly Magazine, 2020
• R&D 100 Award Finalist
• Winner of the 2016 Fisher Innovation Challenge
• Nicholson Power Systems Engineering Fellowship

• D. Roberson and J. F. O'Brien, “Variable Loop Gain Using Excessive Regeneration Detection for a Delayed Wide-Area Control System”, US Patent No.: 10,355,485 B2, U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, Jul. 16, 2019
• J. C. Bell, N. Kharadia, and D. Roberson, “Fuel Supply Chains in the Western Interconnect: Evaluating Availability During Extreme Weather Events," The Electricity Journal, vol. 33, Jan. 2020
• D. Roberson and J. F. O'Brien, “Asymmetric Dual Sensor Latency in Distributed Control," IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, vol. 34, pp. 4533-4541, Nov. 2019
• A. Al Rashdan and D. Roberson, “A Frequency Domain Control Perspective on Xenon Resistance for Load Following of Thermal Nuclear Reactors," IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science, vol. 66, pp. 2034-2041, Sep. 2019
• D. Roberson and J. F. O'Brien, “Variable loop gain using excessive regeneration detection for a delayed wide-area control system," IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, vol. 9, pp. 6623-6632, Nov. 2018
• D. Roberson and J. F. O'Brien, “Loop Shaping of a Wide-Area Damping Controller Using HVDC," IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, vol. 32, pp. 2354-2361, May 2017