Qiwei Du is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE), University at Buffalo (UB). His research focuses on task and motion planning for long-horizon mobile manipulation in complex, cluttered environments, with current interests in skill discovery for improving planning efficiency and failure recovery. He received a Presidential Fellowship from UB. He received the SAIR Rising STAR Award 2025, which was the highest honor for junior researchers in SAIR Lab.

Education

Ph.D., Computer Science and Engineering, University at Buffalo (UB), USA, Aug. 2024 - Present
B.E., Computer Science and Technology, Tongji University (TJU), China, Sept. 2020 - Jun. 2024

Experience

Visiting Researcher, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), USA, Jun. 2026 - Aug. 2026
Visiting Researcher, Northeastern University (NEU), USA, Jul. 2023 - Dec. 2023

Awards

IROS Best Paper Award on Cognitive Robotics, 2026
IROS Best Workshop Paper Award, 2026
SAIR Rising STAR Award 2025
Presidential Fellowship

Emails

Work Email: qiweid@sairlab.org
School Email: qiweidu@buffalo.edu

Publications

First-Author Publications

Fast Task Planning with Neuro-Symbolic Relaxation.
Qiwei Du, Bowen Li, Yi Du, Shaoshu Su, Taimeng Fu, Zitong Zhan, Zhipeng Zhao, Chen Wang.
IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L), vol. 11, no. 3, pp. 3684–3691, 2026.

An elegant real-world demonstration of interactive navigation
```
@article{du2026fast,
  title = {Fast Task Planning with Neuro-Symbolic Relaxation},
  author = {Du, Qiwei and Li, Bowen and Du, Yi and Su, Shaoshu and Fu, Taimeng and Zhan, Zitong and Zhao, Zhipeng and Wang, Chen},
  journal = {IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L)},
  year = {2026},
  volume = {11},
  number = {3},
  pages = {3684-3691},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.15975},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/flax/},
  code = {https://github.com/sair-lab/flax},
  video = {https://youtu.be/_4DYcqwycnQ},
  cover = {/img/posts/2025-07-21-flax/Flax.mp4},
  addendum = {An elegant real-world demonstration of interactive navigation}
}
```
```
Du, Qiwei and Li, Bowen and Du, Yi and Su, Shaoshu and Fu, Taimeng and Zhan, Zitong and Zhao, Zhipeng and Wang, Chen, "Fast Task Planning with Neuro-Symbolic Relaxation," IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L), 2026.
```
Neuro-Symbolic Learning for Long-Horizon Task Planning Under Complex Logical Constraints.
Qiwei Du, Zitong Zhan, Shaoshu Su, Bowen Li, Yi Du, Zhipeng Zhao, Taimeng Fu, Sebastian Scherer, Jiaoyang Li, Chen Wang.
arXiv preprint arXiv:2606.06877, 2026.

Best Paper Award at IROS Workshop on Embodied Neuro-Symbolic AI for Reliable and Safe Robotics
```
@article{du2026iflax,
  title = {Neuro-Symbolic Learning for Long-Horizon Task Planning Under Complex Logical Constraints},
  author = {Du, Qiwei and Zhan, Zitong and Su, Shaoshu and Li, Bowen and Du, Yi and Zhao, Zhipeng and Fu, Taimeng and Scherer, Sebastian and Li, Jiaoyang and Wang, Chen},
  journal = {arXiv preprint arXiv:2606.06877},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.06877},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/iflax/},
  video = {https://youtu.be/aRkq4TXYEhM},
  cover = {/img/posts/2026-06-08-iflax/iflax_cover_video.mp4},
  addendum = {Best Paper Award at IROS Workshop on Embodied Neuro-Symbolic AI for Reliable and Safe Robotics}
}
```
```
Du, Qiwei and Zhan, Zitong and Su, Shaoshu and Li, Bowen and Du, Yi and Zhao, Zhipeng and Fu, Taimeng and Scherer, Sebastian and Li, Jiaoyang and Wang, Chen, "Neuro-Symbolic Learning for Long-Horizon Task Planning Under Complex Logical Constraints," arXiv preprint arXiv:2606.06877, 2026.
```

Collaborative Publications

VL-Nav: Neuro-Symbolic Reasoning-based Vision-Language Navigation.
Yi Du, Taimeng Fu, Zhipeng Zhao, Shaoshu Su, Zitong Zhan, Qiwei Du, Zhuoqun Chen, Bowen Li, Chen Wang.
IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 2026.

IROS Best Paper Award on Cognitive Robotics
```
@inproceedings{du2026vlnav,
  title = {{VL-Nav}: Neuro-Symbolic Reasoning-based Vision-Language Navigation},
  author = {Du, Yi and Fu, Taimeng and Zhao, Zhipeng and Su, Shaoshu and Zhan, Zitong and Du, Qiwei and Chen, Zhuoqun and Li, Bowen and Wang, Chen},
  year = {2026},
  booktitle = {IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.00931},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/vlnav/},
  cover = {/img/posts/2025-02-01-vlnav/vlnav_cover.mp4},
  addendum = {IROS Best Paper Award on Cognitive Robotics}
}
```
```
Du, Yi and Fu, Taimeng and Zhao, Zhipeng and Su, Shaoshu and Zhan, Zitong and Du, Qiwei and Chen, Zhuoqun and Li, Bowen and Wang, Chen, "VL-Nav: Neuro-Symbolic Reasoning-based Vision-Language Navigation," IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 2026.
```
Learning When to Jump for Off-road Navigation.
Zhipeng Zhao, Taimeng Fu, Shaoshu Su, Qiwei Du, Ehsan Tarkesh Esfahani, Karthik Dantu, Souma Chowdhury, Chen Wang.
Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS), 2026.

Best Paper Runner-Up Award at IROS Workshop on Bridging Perspectives in Navigation
```
@inproceedings{zhao2026learning,
  title = {Learning When to Jump for Off-road Navigation},
  author = {Zhao, Zhipeng and Fu, Taimeng and Su, Shaoshu and Du, Qiwei and Esfahani, Ehsan Tarkesh and Dantu, Karthik and Chowdhury, Souma and Wang, Chen},
  booktitle = {Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.00877},
  code = {https://github.com/sair-lab/mat},
  video = {https://youtu.be/1MuxfwPj56c},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/mat/},
  cover = {/img/posts/2026-02-09-mat/mat.mp4},
  addendum = {Best Paper Runner-Up Award at IROS Workshop on Bridging Perspectives in Navigation}
}
```
```
Zhao, Zhipeng and Fu, Taimeng and Su, Shaoshu and Du, Qiwei and Esfahani, Ehsan Tarkesh and Dantu, Karthik and Chowdhury, Souma and Wang, Chen, "Learning When to Jump for Off-road Navigation," Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS), 2026.
```
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.
```
LogiCity: Advancing Neuro-Symbolic AI with Abstract Urban Simulation.
Bowen Li, Zhaoyu Li, Qiwei Du, Jinqi Luo, Wenshan Wang, Yaqi Xie, Simon Stepputtis, Chen Wang, Katia P. Sycara, Pradeep Kumar Ravikumar, Alexander Gray, Xujie Si, Sebastian Scherer.
Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), vol. 37, pp. 69840–69864, 2024.
```
@inproceedings{li2024logicity,
  title = {{LogiCity}: Advancing Neuro-Symbolic AI with Abstract Urban Simulation},
  author = {Li, Bowen and Li, Zhaoyu and Du, Qiwei and Luo, Jinqi and Wang, Wenshan and Xie, Yaqi and Stepputtis, Simon and Wang, Chen and Sycara, Katia P. and Ravikumar, Pradeep Kumar and Gray, Alexander and Si, Xujie and Scherer, Sebastian},
  booktitle = {Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS)},
  year = {2024},
  volume = {37},
  pages = {69840--69864},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.00773},
  website = {https://sairlab.org/datasets/logicity/},
  code = {https://github.com/Jaraxxus-Me/LogiCity},
  cover = {/img/posts/2024-11-09-logicity/logicity.gif}
}
```
```
Li, Bowen and Li, Zhaoyu and Du, Qiwei and Luo, Jinqi and Wang, Wenshan and Xie, Yaqi and Stepputtis, Simon and Wang, Chen and Sycara, Katia P. and Ravikumar, Pradeep Kumar and Gray, Alexander and Si, Xujie and Scherer, Sebastian, "LogiCity: Advancing Neuro-Symbolic AI with Abstract Urban Simulation," Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), 2024.
```

Media Coverage

Invited Talk: Efficient Neuro-symbolic Planning for Long-horizon Robot Tasks (Mandarin: Bilibili, TechBeat)
AgileX Robotics’ Post: iFlax × AgileX PiPER: Smarter Long-Horizon Task Planning

Motto

Be a heavy sword with no blades.
Cleave the unknown with no tricks.