Feb. 4, 2026 — The American Control Conference (ACC), the annual conference of the American Automatic Control Council (AACC), will be held May 26-29, 2026, at the Hilton New Orleans Riverside. The International Society of Automation (ISA) is a co-sponsor of the ACC, along with eight other professional societies.
It is a 4-day event with about 1,300 attendees presenting and discussing research innovations in control for many disciplines. It includes a day of workshops (May 26) intended to bridge the research-practice gap to benefit practitioners, innovators and instructors.
To explore all workshops and the conference program, visit the website then use the “Program” link then “Workshops." Here is a brief sampling of several workshops:
1. Practical methods for control systems
There is a well-known “gap” between control theory, research, and practice. Today, the growing power of computation platforms, sensors, actuators, the “Internet of Things”, autonomous bots, drives an explosion of applications requiring feedback control. This workshop is intended to allow:
- practitioners to improve their applications through best practices supported by theory, and
- control researchers to credibly apply their work.
2. Nonlinear optimization: Techniques for engineering
Optimization is fundamental for calculating control action, modeling, design of processes, equipment, and products. This workshop will be a practical guide for those using multivariable, constraint-handling, nonlinear optimization. It will explain the search algorithms for common gradient-based and direct-search optimization techniques, but the focus is on user choices for the:
- objective function,
- constraints,
- convergence criterion,
- number of replications to ensure finding the global optimum, and
- matching the algorithm to the application characteristics.
3. Pyomo.DoE: An open-source Pythonic Tool for optimal experimental design
Digital twins and model-based control rely on data, yet experiments are often expensive and constrained. Optimal experimental design provides a systematic way to select experiments that reduce model uncertainty. This workshop introduces Pyomo.DoE, an open-source, equation-oriented framework. By treating experimental inputs (e.g., control trajectories, sampling times, and operating conditions) as decision variables, Pyomo.DoE enables automated experiment design for complex dynamic systems. For more, visit: https://dowlinglab.github.io/pyomo-doe/Readme.html.
4. Hands‑on distributed control using the DERConnect Testbed
This workshop provides hands-on training on the NSF-funded DERConnect testbed to explore implementation of distributed control algorithms for applications related to Distributed Energy Resources, Energy Systems, and Cybersecurity. The workshop goals are to provide users with information and training to become expert users of DERConnect software so that they can run in-depth and realistic power system studies remotely.
Conference registration is not required for workshop registration.
