Chao Liu

Postdoctoral Associate

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Biography

I am currently a Postdoctoral Associate at MIT CSAIL working with Professor Daniela Rus. I obtained my Ph.D. degree from the University of Pennsylvania advised by Professor Mark Yim (ModLab in UPenn GRASP Lab ). My PhD thesis is about swarm, modular, and parallel robotics, including hardware design, modeling, control, and motion planning of two robotic systems — SMORES-EP and Variable Topology Truss. I am currently working on soft robotics and control, contact modeling, and multimodal sensing for robotics manipulation, including a multimodal dataset of human activities, dexterous robotic hands, textile-based sensing and actuation, and contact modeling of soft materials.

I am on the 2023-2024 job market. Please feel free to reach out if you have potential positions.

News

[01/2024] Two papers are accepted to ICRA 2024!
[01/2024] Three papers are accepted to ICLR 2024!
[11/2023] One paper is accepted by Nature Communication!

Interests

Swarm and Modular Robotics
Soft Robotics
Grasping and Manipulation
Control
Motion Planning
Multimodal Sensing

Education

PhD in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, 2021
University of Pennsylvania
MS in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, 2014
University of Pennsylvania
BS in Mechanical Engineering and Automation, 2012
Dalian Jiaotong University

Projects

Soft Material Modeling

Simulation engines of soft materials for manipulation tasks.

Textile-based Sensing and Actuation

Textile-based digital fabrication for sensing and actuation.

Robotic Hand

Bio-inspired dexterous robotic hands to imitate human manipulation skills.

ActionSense

A multimodal dataset for human activities

Whole-Body Motion Control in Real Time

Control and planning for dexterous manipulation in real time.

SMORES-EP

SMORES-EP, a hybrid swarm and modular robotic system.

Variable Topology Truss

Variable Topology Truss robots are hyper-redundant parallel modular robots.

Aerial Manipulation

A novel manipulator for aerial manipulation.

Preprint and Under Review

Control and Grasping of an Anthropomorphic Robotic Hand Built by Bio-inspired Robotic Fingers

Chao Liu, Wil Norton, Branden Romero, Hanna Matusik, Edward Adelson, Daniela Rus

February, 2024

Control and Grasping of an Anthropomorphic Robotic Hand Built by Bio-inspired Robotic Fingers

Journal Articles

Adaptive Tactile Interaction Transfer via Digitally Embroidered Smart Gloves

Yiyue Luo, Chao Liu, Young Joong Lee, Joseph DelPreto, Kui Wu, Michael Foshey, Daniela Rus, Tomás Palacios, Yunzhu Li, Antonio Torralba, Wojciech Matusik

October, 2023 Nature Communication (Accepted)

Adaptive Tactile Interaction Transfer via Digitally Embroidered Smart Gloves

SMORES-EP, a Modular Robot with Parallel Self-assembly

Chao Liu, Qian Lin, Hyun Kim, Mark Yim

November, 2022 Autonomous Robots

SMORES-EP, a Modular Robot with Parallel Self-assembly

Motion Planning for Variable Topology Trusses: Reconfiguration and Locomotion

Chao Liu, Sencheng Yu, Mark Yim

October, 2022 IEEE Transactions on Robotics

Motion Planning for Variable Topology Trusses: Reconfiguration and Locomotion

A Low-Cost, Highly Customizable Solution for Position Estimation in Modular Robots

Chao Liu, Tarik Tosun, Mark Yim

January, 2021 Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics

A Low-Cost, Highly Customizable Solution for Position Estimation in Modular Robots

A Quadratic Programming Approach to Manipulation in Real-Time Using Modular Robots

Chao Liu, Mark Yim

January, 2021 The International Journal of Robotic Computing (Invited)

A Quadratic Programming Approach to Manipulation in Real-Time Using Modular Robots

A Distributed Reconfiguration Planning Algorithm for Modular Robots

Chao Liu, Michael Whitzer, Mark Yim

October, 2019 IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters

A Distributed Reconfiguration Planning Algorithm for Modular Robots

Conference Papers

Thin-Shell Object Manipulations with Differentiable Physics Simulations

Yian Wang, Juntian Zheng, Zhehuan Chen, Xian Zhou, Gu Zhang, Chao Liu, Chuang Gan

May, 2024 The Twelfth International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR) (Accepted)

Thin-Shell Object Manipulations with Differentiable Physics Simulations

Learning to Jointly Understand Visual and Tactile Signals

Yichen Li, Yilun Du, Chao Liu, Chao Liu, Francis Williams, Michael Foshey, Benjamin Eckart, Jan Kautz, Joshua B. Tenenbaum, Antonio Torralba, Wojciech Matusik

May, 2024 The Twelfth International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR) (Accepted)

Learning to Jointly Understand Visual and Tactile Signals

DiffTactile: A Physics-Based Differentiable Tactile Simulator for Contact-Rich Robotic Manipulation

Zilin Si, Gu Zhang, Qingwei Ben, Xian Zhou, Branden Romero, Chao Liu, Chuang Gan

May, 2024 The Twelfth International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR) (Accepted)

DiffTactile: A Physics-Based Differentiable Tactile Simulator for Contact-Rich Robotic Manipulation

Directly 3D Printed, Pneumatically Actuated Multi-Material Robotic Hand

Hanna Matusik, Chao Liu, Daniela Rus

October, 2023 2024 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (Accepted)

Directly 3D Printed, Pneumatically Actuated Multi-Material Robotic Hand

Liquids Identification and Monitoring via Digitally Fabricated Impedance Sensors

Junyi Zhu, Young Joong Lee, Yiyue Luo, Tianyu Xu, Chao Liu, Daniela Rus, Stefanie Mueller, Wojciech Matusik

October, 2023 2024 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (Accepted)

Liquids Identification and Monitoring via Digitally Fabricated Impedance Sensors

Towards Cooperative Flight Control Using Visual-Attention

Lianhao Yin, Makram Chahine, Tsun-Hsuan Wang, Tim Seyde, Chao Liu, Mathias Lechner, Ramin Hasani, Daniela Rus

October, 2023 2023 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)

Towards Cooperative Flight Control Using Visual-Attention

A Modular Bio-inspired Robotic Hand with High Sensitivity

Chao Liu, Andrea Moncada, Hanna Matusik, Deniz Irem Erus, Daniela Rus

April, 2023 2023 IEEE International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft)

A Modular Bio-inspired Robotic Hand with High Sensitivity

ActionSense: A Multimodal Dataset for Human Activities Using Wearable Sensors in a Kitchen Environment

Joseph DelPreto, Chao Liu, Yiyue Luo, Michael Foshey, Yunzhu Li, Antonio Torralba, Wojciech Matusik, Daniela Rus

November, 2022 36th Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS 2022) Track on Datasets and Benchmarks

ActionSense: A Multimodal Dataset for Human Activities Using Wearable Sensors in a Kitchen Environment

A Quadratic Programming Approach to Modular Robot Control and Motion Planning

Chao Liu, Mark Yim

November, 2020 2020 Fourth IEEE International Conference on Robotic Computing (IRC)

A Quadratic Programming Approach to Modular Robot Control and Motion Planning

Motion Planning for Variable Topology Truss Modular Robot

Chao Liu, Sencheng Yu, Mark Yim

July, 2020 Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)

Motion Planning for Variable Topology Truss Modular Robot

A Fast Configuration Space Algorithm for Variable Topology Truss Modular Robots

Chao Liu, Sencheng Yu, Mark Yim

May, 2020 2020 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)

A Fast Configuration Space Algorithm for Variable Topology Truss Modular Robots

Parallel Self-assembly with SMORES-EP, a Modular Robot

Chao Liu, Qian Lin, Hyun Kim, Mark Yim

May, 2020 2020 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (Accepted)

Parallel Self-assembly with SMORES-EP, a Modular Robot

Reconfiguration Motion Planning for Variable Topology Truss

Chao Liu, Mark Yim

November, 2019 2019 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)

Reconfiguration Motion Planning for Variable Topology Truss

Spiral Zipper Manipulator for Aerial Grasping and Manipulation

Chao Liu, Abhraneel Bera, Thulani Tsabedze, Daniel Edgar, Mark Yim

November, 2019 2019 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)

Spiral Zipper Manipulator for Aerial Grasping and Manipulation

Toward Lateral Aerial Grasping Manipulation Using Scalable Suction

Chad C. Kessens, Matthew Horowitz, Chao Liu, James Dotterweich, Mark Yim, Harris L. Edge

May, 2019 2019 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)

Toward Lateral Aerial Grasping Manipulation Using Scalable Suction

Configuration Recognition with Distributed Information for Modular Robots

Chao Liu, Mark Yim

December, 2017 IFRR International Symposium on Robotics Research (ISRR)

Configuration Recognition with Distributed Information for Modular Robots

PaintPots: Low Cost, Accurate, Highly Customizable Potentiometers for Position Sensing

Tarik Tosun, Daniel Edgar, Chao Liu, Thulani Tsabedze, Mark Yim

May, 2017 2017 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)

PaintPots: Low Cost, Accurate, Highly Customizable Potentiometers for Position Sensing

Design and Characterization of the EP-Face Connector

Tarik Tosun, Jay Davey, Chao Liu, Mark Yim

October, 2016 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)

Design and Characterization of the EP-Face Connector

Contact

chaoliu[at]csail.mit.edu
32 Vassar St, Cambridge, MA 02139