Qihang Li is now a PhD student at North Carlolina State University. He was a Research Assistant at Duke University and was a research intern at the Spatial AI and Robotics (SAIR) Lab from 2023 summer to 2024 summer. Prior to joining the SAIR lab, he pursued an MSE in Robotics at Johns Hopkins University. Qihang’s past research primarily revolved around continuum manipulators, and he has concentrated on perception and planning with the objective of reducing surgical injuries in orthopedic surgery. In the SAIR lab, Qihang plans to delve deeper into his interest in the planning and control of mobile robots.

Education

Ph.D. in Robotics, North Carolina State University, USA, Aug. 2025 - Present
Master, Engineering in Robotics, Johns Hopkins University, USA, Sep. 2021 - Mar. 2023
B.E., Mechatronics, University of Liverpool / Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, UK / China, Sep. 2017 - May 2021

Experience

Research Assistant, Duke University, USA, Nov. 2024 - Aug. 2025
Research Intern, University at Buffalo (UB), USA, Jul. 2023 - Oct. 2024
Research Assistant, Johns Hopkins University, USA, Sep. 2022 - Aug. 2023

Other Information

Work Email: qihang_li@foxmail.com

Publication

Imperative Learning: A Self-supervised Neuro-Symbolic Learning Framework for Robot Autonomy.
Chen Wang, Kaiyi Ji, Junyi Geng, Zhongqiang Ren, Taimeng Fu, Fan Yang, Yifan Guo, Haonan He, Xiangyu Chen, Zitong Zhan, Qiwei Du, Shaoshu Su, Bowen Li, Yuheng Qiu, Yi Du, Qihang Li, Yifan Yang, Xiao Lin, Zhipeng Zhao.
International Journal of Robotics Research (IJRR), 2025.

Unifying robot autonomy via neuro-symbolic learning
```
@article{wang2025imperative,
  title = {Imperative Learning: A Self-supervised Neuro-Symbolic Learning Framework for Robot Autonomy},
  author = {Wang, Chen and Ji, Kaiyi and Geng, Junyi and Ren, Zhongqiang and Fu, Taimeng and Yang, Fan and Guo, Yifan and He, Haonan and Chen, Xiangyu and Zhan, Zitong and Du, Qiwei and Su, Shaoshu and Li, Bowen and Qiu, Yuheng and Du, Yi and Li, Qihang and Yang, Yifan and Lin, Xiao and Zhao, Zhipeng},
  journal = {International Journal of Robotics Research (IJRR)},
  year = {2025},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2406.16087},
  code = {https://github.com/sair-lab/iSeries},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/iseries},
  cover = {/img/posts/2024-07-02-iSeries/il-cover.jpg},
  addendum = {Unifying robot autonomy via neuro-symbolic learning}
}
```
```
Wang, Chen and Ji, Kaiyi and Geng, Junyi and Ren, Zhongqiang and Fu, Taimeng and Yang, Fan and Guo, Yifan and He, Haonan and Chen, Xiangyu and Zhan, Zitong and Du, Qiwei and Su, Shaoshu and Li, Bowen and Qiu, Yuheng and Du, Yi and Li, Qihang and Yang, Yifan and Lin, Xiao and Zhao, Zhipeng, "Imperative Learning: A Self-supervised Neuro-Symbolic Learning Framework for Robot Autonomy," International Journal of Robotics Research (IJRR), 2025.
```
iKap: Kinematics-aware Planning with Imperative Learning.
Qihang Li, Zhuoqun Chen, Haoze Zheng, Haonan He, Shaoshu Su, Junyi Geng, Chen Wang.
IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), pp. 10164–10170, 2025.

First imperative learning planner that respects robot kinematics constraints
```
@inproceedings{li2025ikap,
  title = {{iKap}: Kinematics-aware Planning with Imperative Learning},
  author = {Li, Qihang and Chen, Zhuoqun and Zheng, Haoze and He, Haonan and Su, Shaoshu and Geng, Junyi and Wang, Chen},
  booktitle = {IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)},
  year = {2025},
  pages = {10164--10170},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2412.09496},
  video = {https://youtu.be/7HPAMFbHc4U},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/iKap},
  cover = {/img/posts/2024-12-12-ikap/cover.gif},
  addendum = {First imperative learning planner that respects robot kinematics constraints}
}
```
```
Li, Qihang and Chen, Zhuoqun and Zheng, Haoze and He, Haonan and Su, Shaoshu and Geng, Junyi and Wang, Chen, "iKap: Kinematics-aware Planning with Imperative Learning," IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 2025.
```
PyPose v0.6: The Imperative Programming Interface for Robotics.
Zitong Zhan, Xiangfu Li, Qihang Li, Haonan He, Abhinav Pandey, Haitao Xiao, Yangmengfei Xu, Xiangyu Chen, Kuan Xu, Kun Cao, Zhipeng Zhao, Zihan Wang, Huan Xu, Zihang Fang, Yutian Chen, Wentao Wang, Xu Fang, Yi Du, Tianhao Wu, Xiao Lin, Yuheng Qiu, Fan Yang, Jingnan Shi, Shaoshu Su, Yiren Lu, Taimeng Fu, Karthik Dantu, Jiajun Wu, Lihua Xie, Marco Hutter, Luca Carlone, Sebastian Scherer, Daning Huang, Yaoyu Hu, Junyi Geng, Chen Wang.
IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) Workshop, 2023.
```
@inproceedings{zhan2023pypose,
  title = {{PyPose} v0.6: The Imperative Programming Interface for Robotics},
  author = {Zhan, Zitong and Li, Xiangfu and Li, Qihang and He, Haonan and Pandey, Abhinav and Xiao, Haitao and Xu, Yangmengfei and Chen, Xiangyu and Xu, Kuan and Cao, Kun and Zhao, Zhipeng and Wang, Zihan and Xu, Huan and Fang, Zihang and Chen, Yutian and Wang, Wentao and Fang, Xu and Du, Yi and Wu, Tianhao and Lin, Xiao and Qiu, Yuheng and Yang, Fan and Shi, Jingnan and Su, Shaoshu and Lu, Yiren and Fu, Taimeng and Dantu, Karthik and Wu, Jiajun and Xie, Lihua and Hutter, Marco and Carlone, Luca and Scherer, Sebastian and Huang, Daning and Hu, Yaoyu and Geng, Junyi and Wang, Chen},
  year = {2023},
  booktitle = {IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) Workshop},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.13035},
  code = {https://github.com/pypose/pypose},
  video = {https://youtu.be/XDtUDIWuGng},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/pypose/},
  cover = {/img/pubs/pypose-v0.6.jpg}
}
```
```
Zhan, Zitong and Li, Xiangfu and Li, Qihang and He, Haonan and Pandey, Abhinav and Xiao, Haitao and Xu, Yangmengfei and Chen, Xiangyu and Xu, Kuan and Cao, Kun and Zhao, Zhipeng and Wang, Zihan and Xu, Huan and Fang, Zihang and Chen, Yutian and Wang, Wentao and Fang, Xu and Du, Yi and Wu, Tianhao and Lin, Xiao and Qiu, Yuheng and Yang, Fan and Shi, Jingnan and Su, Shaoshu and Lu, Yiren and Fu, Taimeng and Dantu, Karthik and Wu, Jiajun and Xie, Lihua and Hutter, Marco and Carlone, Luca and Scherer, Sebastian and Huang, Daning and Hu, Yaoyu and Geng, Junyi and Wang, Chen, "PyPose v0.6: The Imperative Programming Interface for Robotics," IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) Workshop, 2023.
```