Q. How did your education and early career lead to your initial and continuing interest in the control field? Paulo: During my undergraduate studies, the subjects I enjoyed the most were always those that were mathematically more demanding. This narrowed down the choice of topics I wanted to pursue in my "licenciatura" thesis. I was fortunate to work on the control of the first Portuguese satellite for my thesis, and, although the algorithms I developed were never implemented, I realized that the field of control offers the opportunity to marry beautiful mathematical techniques with very concrete engineering applications. After this experience, I decided to deepen my knowledge of control in my Ph.D. studies. Unfortunately, enlightenment has always been an illusion to me: as I get closer to an answer, I find more unanswered questions!