Xiang Zhang

I’m a fifth-year Ph.D. student in Robotics at the University of California, Berkeley. I work with Prof. Masayoshi Tomizuka in the Mechanical Systems Control (MSC) Laboratory.

My research interest lies in the interdisciplinary combination of robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), and control theories with applications to robot contact-rich manipulation, robot skill learning, and learning/optimization-based compliance control.

Here is my Curriculum Vitae.

Recent Updates

• Aug 2023: Our paper “Efficient Sim-to-real Transfer of Contact-Rich Manipulation Skills with Online Admittance Residual Learning” is accepted by CoRL 2023.
• Aug 2023: I am selected for DSCD Rising Stars Invited Talks at MECC 2023
• May 2023: I start my Robot learning research internship at the Autodesk Research.
• Jan 2023: Paper “Learning Generalizable Pivoting Skills” is accepted to ICRA 2023.
• May 2022: I start my research intern at the Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories (MERL).
• May 2022: Our paper “Safe Online Gain Optimization for Cartesian Space Variable Impedance Control” is accepted by CASE 2022.
• Feb 2022: Our paper “Learning Insertion Primitives with Discrete-Continuous Hybrid Action Space for Robotic Assembly Tasks” is accepted by ICRA 2022.
• Sep 2021: Our work about optimization-basd variable impedance control is presented at the Variable Impedance Robotics Skills: Challenges and Opportunities Workshop of IROS’21
• Jun 2021: Our paper “Online Learning of Unknown Dynamics for Model-Based Controllers in Legged Locomotion” is accepted by RA-L
• Feb 2021: Our paper “Learning Variable Impedance Control via Inverse Reinforcement Learning for Force-Related Tasks” is accepted by RA-L
• Jan 2021: Our paper “Feedback-based digital higher-order terminal sliding mode for 6-dof industrial manipulators” is accepted by ACC’21
• Aug 2019: I join Mechanical System Control Lab at UC Berkeley as a Ph.D. student!

Education

• Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, UC Berkeley, 2019 - 2024 (Expected)

  • Major: Controls   Minors: Robotics, Artificial Intelligence
  • GPA: 3.97/4.0    Advisor: Prof. Masayoshi Tomizuka
  • Research Interest: Robot Skill Learning, Robotic Manipulation, machine learning for robot control

• B.E. in Mechanical Engineering, University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), 2015 - 2019

  • GPA: 3.83/4.3    Ranking: 1/60