Captain Nicholas J. Marco is an instructor of Mechanical and Systems Engineering in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the United States Air Force Academy. He instructs courses in the Fundamentals of Mechanics and Introduction to Systems Engineering.

Captain Marco previously served as Chief of System Safety for the ISR & SOF Directorate, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Wright Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. His primary responsibilities included identifying safety hazards and tracking associated risk, coordinating program mishap history, assisting in airworthiness and test review process, specifically for the MQ-9 and HH-60W platforms. Previous to this Captain Marco was a Design & Analysis Engineer, Aerospace Systems Directorate, Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. In this role his responsibilities included the management and execution of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations, experimental testing, and data analysis of next-gen Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS), aero-elastic wing platforms, and missile systems. In this role he also managed $11.3M worth of advanced technology development programs which are furthering the state of the art in aircraft conceptual design.

Captain Marco received his commission in 2016 through the U.S. Air Force Academy from which he graduated with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering. His first assignment was as a student at the Air Force Institute of Technology from which he earned a M.S. in Aeronautical Engineering. While at AFIT his research focused on computational fluid mechanics and specifically, how the methods are applied to hypersonic flow conditions.

Captain Marco has also served as an adjunct professor at Sinclair Community College where he taught undergraduate classes in Engineering Mechanics.

Bachelor of Science, Mechanical Engineering, U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado (2016)

Master of Science, Aeronautical Engineering, Air Force Institute of Technology, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio (2018)

Student, Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Air Force Institute of Technology, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio (August 2016 − March 2018)

Aerospace Design & Analysis Engineer, Air Vehicles Design & Analysis Branch, Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio (March 2018 − April 2020)

MQ-9 System Safety Engineer, Medium Altitude UAS Division, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio (April 2020 − April 2021)

Chief of System Safety, ISR & SF Directorate, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio (April 2021 − April 2022)

Instructor of Mechanical Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, United States Air Force Academy, Colorado (April 2021 − Present)

Air Force Institute of Technology, Company Grade Officer of the Quarter, 4Q 2017

United States Air Force Academy Department of Mechanical Engineering, New Instructor of the Year AY 2022-23

Air Force Achievement Medal

Air Force Commendation Medal

Hypersonics, Kinetic Weapon Separation, Computational Fluid Dynamics, Shock-Boundary Layer Interactions, System Safety, System Architecture