On April 10th, Lorenzo Nelli, Robotics Developer in our Software & Control Systems Department, graduated with highest honours: 110/110 cum laude.

Undertaking his thesis internship at DRASS, Lorenzo worked closely with the development of our underwater vehicle systems and actively contributed to the 2025 DS8 sea trials, gaining hands-on experience under real operational conditions.

His thesis explored how underwater vehicles can be designed and tested through advanced simulation before physical deployment. At its core, the work developed a digital model of the DS8 submersible in MATLAB/Simulink, and integrated it into Unreal Engine, creating a real-time 3D environment that replicates vehicle behaviour under realistic conditions.

Special thanks go to his DRASS colleagues Luca Biasci (Defence Design – Electrical/Electronic Engineer), Valerio Imbriolo (Software & Control Systems Engineer), and Lorenzo Franchini (Defence Design – Mechanical Engineer), and to Prof. Lorenzo Pollini (Università di Pisa) for their invaluable mentorship.

Congratulations to Lorenzo on this outstanding achievement—we wish him continued success in the underwater robotics field at DRASS.