Open Positions

Open Positions at the National University of Singapore (NUS): 

1. Two China Scholarship Council visiting opportunities per year (CSC联合培养博士生项目,12–24 months)

2. CSC funded 4-year PhD (CSC攻读博士学位项目) 

3. Self-funded 4-year PhD

4. CSC funded postdoc positions (国家公派博士后项目)

Research direction: control theory, multi agent control, learning control, robot control, reinforcement learning, and related topics

Work location: Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore 117583.

Contact: xiaocong@nus.edu.sg

Open Positions at Eastern Institute of Technology, Ningbo:

Ph.D.: Our PhD program is in collaboration with top universities such as Shanghai Jiao Tong University (上海交通大学, ranked 54th globally by U.S. News), University of Science and Technology of China (中国科学技术大学, ranked 82nd globally by U.S. News), The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU, ranked 67th globally by U.S. News), and University of Warwick (ranked 69th globally by QS World University Rankings). Upon graduation, your degree will be awarded by the respective collaborating university. Additional details can be found at the bottom of the page.

Postdoc Fellowship (3-4 positions available, salary range: $55,000 - $85,000 USD): The Postdoc Fellowship is not tied to specific ongoing projects, allowing the candidate to propose their own research project within the lab’s scope. The Postdoc Fellowship is in collaboration with Tsinghua University (清华大学, ranked 16th globally by U.S. News) or University of Science and Technology of China (中国科学技术大学, ranked 82nd globally by U.S. News). Upon completing your postdoc, you will receive a postdoctoral certificate awarded by the respective collaborating university. Additional details can be found at the bottom of the page. 

Research Assistant Professor: Applicants must hold a doctoral degree and demonstrate exceptional academic achievement. The successful candidate will continue conducting impactful research, assist the PI in advising students and postdocs, and contribute to the preparation of grant proposals.

Research Assistants/Interns (with the possibility of conversion to a Ph.D. position): These positions are best suited for candidates with a strong desire to pursue a PhD. Comprehensive resources will be provided to support independent or guided research aligned with the candidates’ interests, preparing them for PhD applications at EIT or other universities. Salary range: 4,000–8,000 RMB/month. Additional details can be found at the bottom of the page.

Please email me (xiaocongli@eitech.edu.cn) your CV, research plan (highlighting the research challenges and your methodology) and 1-3 representative research papers if you are interested in robotics, control theory and machine learning. Some examples include:

• Safe Learning-based Control

• Agile Robotics

• Robot Learning

• Learning-based Robot Planning and Control

• Multi-Agent Learning Control

• Contact-Rich Robot Manipulation

• Learning Control for Soft Robotics

• Physical Human-Robot Interaction

• Robot Compliance Control

Some good reference papers to take a look if you are applying for PhD, Research Assistant or Research Intern positions:

1. Brunke, L., Greeff, M., Hall, A. W., Yuan, Z., Zhou, S., Panerati, J., & Schoellig, A. P. (2022). Safe learning in robotics: From learning-based control to safe reinforcement learning. Annual Review of Control, Robotics, and Autonomous Systems, 5(1), 411-444.

2. Dawson, C., Gao, S., & Fan, C. (2023). Safe control with learned certificates: A survey of neural lyapunov, barrier, and contraction methods for robotics and control. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 39(3), 1749-1767.

3. Berkenkamp, F., Schoellig, A. P., & Krause, A. (2016). Safe controller optimization for quadrotors with Gaussian processes. In 2016 IEEE international conference on robotics and automation (ICRA) (pp. 491-496). IEEE.

4. Yuan, Z., Hall, A. W., Zhou, S., Brunke, L., Greeff, M., Panerati, J., & Schoellig, A. P. (2022). Safe-control-gym: A unified benchmark suite for safe learning-based control and reinforcement learning in robotics. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 7(4), 11142-11149.

5. Romero, A., Sun, S., Foehn, P., & Scaramuzza, D. (2022). Model predictive contouring control for time-optimal quadrotor flight. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 38(6), 3340-3356.

6. Coulson, Jeremy, John Lygeros, and Florian Dörfler. "Data-enabled predictive control: In the shallows of the DeePC." In 2019 18th European Control Conference (ECC), pp. 307-312. IEEE, 2019.

7. Richards, S. M., Azizan, N., Slotine, J. J., & Pavone, M. (2023). Control-oriented meta-learning. The International Journal of Robotics Research, 42(10), 777-797.

8. Saied, H., Chemori, A., Bouri, M., El Rafei, M., & Francis, C. (2023). Feedforward super-twisting sliding mode control for robotic manipulators: Application to PKMs. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 39(4), 3167-3184.

9. Jia, J., Zhang, W., Guo, K., Wang, J., Yu, X., Shi, Y., & Guo, L. (2023). Evolver: Online learning and prediction of disturbances for robot control. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 40, 382-402.

10. O’Connell, M., Shi, G., Shi, X., Azizzadenesheli, K., Anandkumar, A., Yue, Y., & Chung, S. J. (2022). Neural-fly enables rapid learning for agile flight in strong winds. Science Robotics, 7(66), eabm6597.

11. Luo, S., Jiang, M., Zhang, S., Zhu, J., Yu, S., Dominguez Silva, I., ... & Su, H. (2024). Experiment-free exoskeleton assistance via learning in simulation. Nature, 630(8016), 353-359.

12. Song, Y., Romero, A., Müller, M., Koltun, V., & Scaramuzza, D. (2023). Reaching the limit in autonomous racing: Optimal control versus reinforcement learning. Science Robotics, 8(82), eadg1462.

13. He, T., Zhang, C., Xiao, W., He, G., Liu, C., & Shi, G. (2024). Agile but safe: Learning collision-free high-speed legged locomotion. arXiv preprint arXiv:2401.17583.

14. Nazeer, M. S., Laschi, C., & Falotico, E. (2024). RL-based adaptive controller for high precision reaching in a soft robot arm. IEEE Transactions on Robotics.

15. Haddadin, S., & Shahriari, E. (2024). Unified force-impedance control. The International Journal of Robotics Research, 43(13), 2112-2141.

16. Jia, J., Yang, Z., Wang, M., Guo, K., Yang, J., Yu, X., & Guo, L. (2024). Feedback Favors the Generalization of Neural ODEs. arXiv preprint arXiv:2410.10253.

17. Wei, L., Feng, H., Yang, Y., Feng, R., Hu, P., Zheng, X., ... & Wu, T. (2024). Closed-loop diffusion control of complex physical systems. arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.03124.

18. Xiao, W., Wang, T. H., Gan, C., & Rus, D. (2023). SafeDiffuser: Safe planning with diffusion probabilistic models. arXiv preprint arXiv:2306.00148

19. Chi, C., Xu, Z., Feng, S., Cousineau, E., Du, Y., Burchfiel, B., ... & Song, S. (2023). Diffusion policy: Visuomotor policy learning via action diffusion. The International Journal of Robotics Research, 02783649241273668.

20. Hou, Y., Liu, Z., Chi, C., Cousineau, E., Kuppuswamy, N., Feng, S., ... & Song, S. (2024). Adaptive Compliance Policy: Learning Approximate Compliance for Diffusion Guided Control. arXiv preprint arXiv:2410.09309.

21. Xue, H., Ren, J., Chen, W., Zhang, G., Fang, Y., Gu, G., ... & Lu, C. (2025). Reactive Diffusion Policy: Slow-Fast Visual-Tactile Policy Learning for Contact-Rich Manipulation. arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.02881.

22. Li, T., Sun, S., Aditya, S. S., & Figueroa, N. (2025). Elastic Motion Policy: An Adaptive Dynamical System for Robust and Efficient One-Shot Imitation Learning. arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.08029.

Additional Details for Postdoc Fellowship

1. Requirements
   Applicants should possess a doctoral degree and demonstrate good academic potential and vision. Candidates must be available to work full-time in Ningbo, China. Ningbo is a thriving coastal city, located near the places where DeepSeek and Unitree were founded.

2. Remuneration and Benefits
   (1) Annual income starting at 400,000+ RMB, with a 200,000 RMB supplement for those selected as an Outstanding Postdoctoral Fellow by EIT. We also offer a monthly allowance to cover lunch, transportation, phone expenses, etc. All PhD graduates are eligible to apply for the Ningbo city government Relocation Allowance for High-Level Talents, which amounts to 150,000 RMB. PhD graduates from universities ranked among the top 200 globally are eligible for an additional government living allowance of 100,000 RMB. Highly subsidized housing options are available.
   (2) 200,000 RMB government start-up research funds is available during the contract period.
   (3) Subsidies of up to 600,000 RMB are available for those employed in Ningbo after the contract period.
   (4) Successful applicants for NSFC projects and provincial research projects will receive 1:1 matching funding support from the Ningbo government.

 1、博士后任职要求 (详情)

 （1）年龄原则上不超过35周岁（如超出可申请破格），并在近3年内已获得或即将获得博士学位。

 （2）具有良好的英文阅读、交流及写作能力，良好的团队协作与沟通协调能力。

 2、工作和生活待遇

 （1）年薪税前40万+，入选东方理工卓越博士后年薪60万+。提供每月津贴，涵盖午餐、交通、电话费用等。此外, 可申请领取宁波市高层次人才安家补助与购房补贴 (至少15万+20万起)。世界排名前200高校的博士可申请政府额外生活补助10万元。

 （2）缴纳五险一金，享受带薪年假、节假日福利。根据政府人才公寓政策条件及房源情况，优先支持请政府人才公寓（可拎包入住)。

 （3）在站期间可向地方政府申请20万元的科研经费资助。

 （4）博士后出站(颁发清华大学或中国科学技术大学博士后证书)后，若留在宁波企事业单位工作的，可享受最高不超过60万元的相关补贴。

 （5）对获得中国博士后科学基金资助和省级博士后科研项目资助的，宁波市给予各类项目1:1配套经费支持。

    (6)  表现优秀者可长聘为研究员序列

Additional Details for Ph.D. and Research Assistants/Interns

本实验室秉承世界一流实验室的管理理念，为学生提供充足的助研津贴和实验设备支持，关注学生身心健康，重视学生的长期职业发展。

• 学生主导的科研工作，导师绝不抢占一作。

• 课题组刚成立，暂无横向企业项目，学生可专心从事基础研究。

• 课题组有专职行政助理，学生无需处理实验器材购买、差旅报销及其他行政相关事务。

• 倡导劳逸结合，鼓励学生进行充足的体育锻炼。

• 为希望继续深造的学生推荐合适的国外博士与博后机会，例如NUS (全奖博士 | CSC攻博 | 自费)、NTU、Harvard等。

课题组博士生名额将优先考虑实验室中表现优秀的科研助理和科研实习生，具体的名额分配将根据学校的安排，同时也会参考学生的意见（例如是否希望出境深造或在国内攻读博士学位）。2025年秋季及之后入学的博士生可入住学校的单人宿舍。

1. 上海交通大学、中国科学技术大学博士生联培

东方理工自2022年起与上海交通大学（2023年起与中科大）开展联合培养博士生招生，实行双导师制，学生在上海交大（中科大）注册学籍，第一年在上海交大（中科大）进行课程学习，毕业后获得上海交大（中科大）博士学位和毕业证书。本科直博生的基本学习年限为5年，其他博士生的基本学习年限为4年，录取类别为非定向就业，学习形式为全日制。博士生在上海交大（中科大）学习期间，提供与该校博士生同等助研津贴；在东方理工工作期间，将为学生提供非常具有竞争力的助研津贴，特别优秀者将视情况给予额外补助。招生简章请见: https://www.eitech.edu.cn/?admission_category=graduate

2. 香港理工大学博士生联培

东方理工自2022年起与香港理工大学开展联合培养博士生招生，实行双导师制，学生前两年在香港理工，后两年在东方理工，毕业后获得香港理工大学博士学位，所获学位与全程在香港理工完成学业的学生完全一致。在香港理工期间，获得与该校博士生同等的奖助学金；在东方理工工作期间，将为学生提供非常具有竞争力的助研津贴，特别优秀者将视情况给予额外补助。招生简章请见: https://www.eitech.edu.cn/?admission_category=graduate