Dynamic Autonomy and Intelligent Robotics Lab

170B Towne Building, 220 S. 33rd Street, Philadelphia PA, 19104


Welcome to the Dynamic Autonomy and Intelligent Robotics (DAIR) Lab!

Our research centers on planning, control, and formal analysis of robots as they interact with the world. Whether a robot is assisting within the home, or operating in a manufacturing plant, the fundamental promise of robotics requires touching and affecting a complex environment in a safe and controlled fashion. We are focused on developing computationally tractable algorithms which enable robots to operate both dynamically and safely as they quickly maneuver through and interact with their environments.

Right now, we are particularly interested in understanding the interplay between the non-smooth dynamics of contact and numerical optimization, and then testing these techniques on both legged robots and robotic manipulation.

We are proud to be a group within the Penn Engineering GRASP Lab.

Recent Updates

Jun 2, 2023 Another honor for Alp! Our paper Stabilization of Complementarity Systems via Contact-Aware Controllers , recieved an Honorable Mention for the 2022 IEEE Transactions on Robotics King-Sun Fu Memorial Best Paper Award. Congratulations to Alp and Phil!
May 26, 2023 We are very excited to congratulate our very own Wanxin Jin who has accepted an offer to join Arizona State University as a tenure-track assistant professor in the coming fall. Wanxin has been a postdoc in the lab since 2021 and has done fantastic work on task-driven modeling for manipulation, through our collaboration with TRI. Congratulations Wanxin!
May 16, 2023 Over the last two years, we’ve been thrilled to have an ongoing collaboration with the Toyota Research Institute (TRI), particularly with the developers of Drake As this project enters its third year, Michael recently answered some questions about the research results and philosophy. Check out the Penn blog post, When Robots Touch the World or the related Penn news article.
Apr 13, 2023 We are looking to hire a postdoc in the area of data-efficient learning and control for dexterous manipulation! Get more information and apply here.
Apr 12, 2023 We received the NSF CAREER award for manipulating novel objects. We’re excited to deepen the connection between non-smooth contact dynamics and low-data learning for dexterous manipulation. This award builds on the work from many students in the lab, and is a credit to their hard work and ingenuity!
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Lab Wiki (private)