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A list of all the posts and pages found on the site. For you robots out there is an XML version available for digesting as well.
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Posts
Future Blog Post
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Blog Post number 4
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Blog Post number 3
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Blog Post number 2
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Blog Post number 1
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portfolio
LiDAR Simultaneous Localization and Mapping
Short description of portfolio item number 1
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Efficient Occupancy Mapping for LiDARs
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publications
ikd-Tree: An Incremental KD Tree for Robotic Applications
Published in Preprint, 2021
This paper proposes an efficient data structure, ikd-Tree, for dynamic space partition. The ikd-Tree incrementally updates a k-d tree with new coming … Read more
Recommended citation:
Cai, Y., Xu, W., & Zhang, F. (2021). ikd-tree: An incremental kd tree for robotic applications. arXiv preprint arXiv:2102.10808. [pdf] [bib]
Avoiding Dynamic Small Obstacles with Onboard Sensing and Computation on Aerial Robots
Published in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL), 2021
In practical applications, autonomous quadrotors are still facing significant challenges, such as the detection and avoidance of very small and even … Read more
Recommended citation:
F. Kong, W. Xu, Y. Cai and F. Zhang, Avoiding Dynamic Small Obstacles With Onboard Sensing and Computation on Aerial Robots," in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 7869-7876, Oct. 2021, doi: 10.1109/LRA.2021.3101877." [pdf] [bib]
Robots’ State Estimation and Observability Analysis Based on Statistical Motion Models
Published in IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology (TCST), 2022
This article presents a generic motion model to capture mobile robots' dynamic behaviors (translation and rotation). The model is based on … Read more
Recommended citation:
W. Xu, D. He, Y. Cai and F. Zhang, Robots' State Estimation and Observability Analysis Based on Statistical Motion Models," in IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, vol. 30, no. 5, pp. 2030-2045, Sept. 2022, doi: 10.1109/TCST.2021.3133080." [pdf] [bib]
FAST-LIO2: Fast Direct Lidar-Inertial Odometry
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2022
This article presents FAST-LIO2: a fast, robust, and versatile LiDAR-inertial odometry framework. Building on a highly efficient tightly coupled … Read more
Recommended citation:
W. Xu, Y. Cai, D. He, J. Lin and F. Zhang, "FAST-LIO2: Fast Direct LiDAR-Inertial Odometry," in IEEE Transactions on Robotics, vol. 38, no. 4, pp. 2053-2073, Aug. 2022, doi: 10.1109/TRO.2022.3141876. [pdf] [bib]
Gemini II: Design, Modeling, and Control of a Compact Yet Efficient Servoless Bi-copter
Published in IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics (TMECH), 2022
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are widely used in the field for tasks that require 3-D movements in space. The simultaneous demand for heavy payload … Read more
Recommended citation:
Y. Qin, N. Chen, Y. Cai, W. Xu and F. Zhang, Gemini II: Design, Modeling, and Control of a Compact Yet Efficient Servoless Bi-copter," in IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics, vol. 27, no. 6, pp. 4304-4315, Dec. 2022, doi: 10.1109/TMECH.2022.3153587." [pdf] [bib]
A Self-rotating, Single-actuated UAV with Extended Sensor Field of View for Autonomous Navigation
Published in Science Robotics, 2023
Uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) rely heavily on visual sensors to perceive obstacles and explore environments. Current UAVs are limited in both … Read more
Recommended citation:
Chen, N., Kong, F., Xu, W., Cai, Y., Li, H., He, D., ... & Zhang, F. (2023). A self-rotating, single-actuated UAV with extended sensor field of view for autonomous navigation. Science Robotics, 8(76), eade4538. [pdf] [bib]
MARSIM: A light-weight point-realistic simulator for LiDAR-based UAVs
Published in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL), 2023
The emergence of LiDAR sensors have brought new opportunities for autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) by advancing navigation safety and … Read more
Recommended citation:
Kong, F., Liu, X., Tang, B., Lin, J., Ren, Y., Cai, Y., ... & Zhang, F. (2023). MARSIM: A light-weight point-realistic simulator for LiDAR-based UAVs. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 8(5), 2954-2961. [pdf] [bib]
Immesh: An immediate lidar localization and meshing framework
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2023
In this paper, we propose a novel LiDAR(-inertial) odometry and mapping framework to achieve the goal of simultaneous localization and meshing in … Read more
Recommended citation:
Lin, J., Yuan, C., Cai, Y., Li, H., Zou, Y., Hong, X., & Zhang, F. (2023). Immesh: An immediate lidar localization and meshing framework. arXiv preprint arXiv:2301.05206. [pdf] [bib]
Trajectory Generation and Tracking Control for Aggressive Tail-Sitter Flights
Published in International Journal of Robotics Research, 2023
We address the theoretical and practical problems related to the trajectory generation and tracking control of tail-sitter UAVs. Theoretically, we … Read more
Recommended citation:
Lu, G., Cai, Y., Chen, N., Kong, F., Ren, Y., & Zhang, F. (2022). Trajectory Generation and Tracking Control for Aggressive Tail-Sitter Flights. arXiv preprint arXiv:2212.11552. [pdf] [bib]
Occupancy Grid Mapping without Ray-Casting for High-resolution Sensors
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2023
Occupancy mapping is a fundamental component of robotic systems to reason about the unknown and known regions of the environment. This article … Read more
Recommended citation:
Y. Cai, F. Kong, Y. Ren, F. Zhu, J. Lin and F. Zhang, "Occupancy Grid Mapping Without Ray-Casting for High-Resolution LiDAR Sensors," in IEEE Transactions on Robotics, doi: 10.1109/TRO.2023.3323936. [pdf] [bib]
MARS-LVIG dataset: A multi-sensor aerial robots SLAM dataset for LiDAR-visual-inertial-GNSS fusion
Published in International Journal of Robotics Research, 2023
In recent years, advancements in Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology have made 3D LiDAR sensors more compact, lightweight, and affordable. … Read more
Recommended citation:
Haotian Li and Yuying Zou and Nan Chen and Jiarong Lin and Xiyuan Liu and Wei Xu and Chunran Zheng and Rundong Li and Dongjiao He and Fanze Kong and Yixi Cai and Zheng Liu and Shunbo Zhou and Kaiwen Xue and Fu Zhang.(2024). MARS-LVIG dataset: A multi-sensor aerial robots SLAM dataset for LiDAR-visual-inertial-GNSS fusion. The International Journal of Robotics Research. [pdf] [bib]
ROG-Map: An Efficient Robocentric Occupancy Grid Map for Large-scene and High-resolution LiDAR-based Motion Planning
Published in IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2024), 2024
Recent advances in LiDAR technology have opened up new possibilities for robotic navigation. Given the widespread use of occupancy grid maps (OGMs) … Read more
Recommended citation:
Ren, Y., Cai, Y., Zhu, F., Liang, S., & Zhang, F. (2023). ROG-map: An efficient robocentric occupancy grid map for large-scene and high-resolution LiDAR-based motion planning. In 2024, International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS). IEEE. [pdf] [bib]
Large-scale Multi-session Point-cloud Map Merging
Published in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RAL), 2024
This paper introduces LAMM, an open-source framework for large-scale multi-session 3D LiDAR point cloud map merging. LAMM can automatically integrate … Read more
Recommended citation:
Wei, H., Li, R., Cai, Y., Yuan, C., Ren, Y., Zou, Z., Wu, H., Zheng, C., Zhou, S., Xue, K., Zhang, F. (2023) "Large-scale Multi-session Point-cloud Map Merging," in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, doi: 10.1109/LRA.2024.3504317 [pdf] [bib]
Swarm-LIO2: Decentralized Efficient LiDAR-inertial Odometry for UAV Swarms
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2024
Aerial swarm systems possess immense potential in various aspects, such as cooperative exploration, target tracking, search and rescue. Efficient, … Read more
Recommended citation:
Zhu, F., Ren, Y., Yin, L., Kong, F., Liu, Q., Xue, R., Liu, W., Cai, Y., Lu, G., Li, H. & Zhang, F. (2024). Swarm-LIO2: Decentralized, Efficient LiDAR-inertial Odometry for UAV Swarms. in IEEE Transactions on Robotics. [pdf] [bib]
Autonomous Tail-Sitter Flights in Unknown Environments
Published in IEEE Transactions on Robotics (TRO), 2024
Trajectory generation for fully autonomous flights of tail-sitter unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) presents substantial challenges due to their highly … Read more
Recommended citation:
Lu, G., Ren, Y., Zhu, F., Li, H., Xue, R., Cai, Y., ... & Zhang, F. (2024). Autonomous Tail-Sitter Flights in Unknown Environments. in IEEE Transactions on Robotics. [pdf] [bib]
LVBA: LiDAR-Visual Bundle Adjustment for RGB Point Cloud Mapping
Published in 2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2025
Point cloud maps with accurate color are crucial in robotics and mapping applications. Existing approaches for producing RGB-colorized maps are … Read more
Recommended citation:
Li, R., Liu, X., Li, H., Liu, Z., Lin, J., Cai, Y., & Zhang, F. (2025). LVBA: LiDAR-Visual Bundle Adjustment for RGB Point Cloud Mapping.in 2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) [pdf] [bib]
Neural Surface Reconstruction and Rendering for LiDAR-Visual Systems
Published in 2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2025
This paper presents a unified surface reconstruction and rendering framework for LiDAR-visual systems, integrating Neural Radiance Fields (NeRF) and … Read more
Recommended citation:
Liu, J., Zheng, C., Wan, Y., Wang, B., Cai, Y., & Zhang, F. Neural Surface Reconstruction and Rendering for LiDAR-Visual Systems. in 2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) [pdf] [bib]
Safety-assured high-speed navigation for MAVs
Published in Science Robotics, 2025
Micro air vehicles (MAVs) capable of high-speed autonomous navigation in unknown environments have the potential to improve applications like search … Read more
Recommended citation:
Ren, Y., Zhu, F., Lu, G., Cai, Y., Yin, L., Kong, F., Lin, J., Chen, N. & Zhang, F. (2025) Safety-assured high-speed navigation for MAVs. in Science Robotics. [pdf] [bib]
talks
Presentation in IROS2022
Published:
In October 2022, I had the privilege of showcasing FAST-LIO2 in International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2022), Kyoto, Japan. It was my first academic presentation in an international conference. I was truly inspired by the passion from the audience about our work and the insightful questions in the Q&A period. I’m delighted to see that FAST-LIO2 has been gaining increasing interest (and GitHub stars :>) since the conference, contributing to the advancement of LiDAR-inertial Odometry espicially in the aspect of incremental data structures. Read more
teaching
MECH3433 Robotics, drones and autonomous ground vehicles (2020-2024)
Teaching Assistant in Undergraduate Course, University of Hong Kong, Department of Mechanical Engineering, 2024
This course aims to cover: modelling of robot kinematics / dynamics; programming on robot embedded control units; characterization and specification of robot actuation; sensing interface for robot feedback control; implementation of machine intelligence algorithms. Read more