Papers
66
Total Citations
13,111
H-Index
27
About
Zexiang Li is a pioneering roboticist whose work spans robotic manipulation, multifingered grasping, and nonholonomic motion planning — fields that sit at the intersection of mathematics, control theory, and mechanical engineering. He is perhaps best known as co-author of "A Mathematical Introduction to Robotic Manipulation," a landmark textbook that has accumulated nearly 9,400 citations across its editions and remains a foundational reference for generations of robotics researchers and engineers worldwide. The work's elegant geometric framework, rooted in screw theory and Lie groups, transformed how kinematics and dynamics are taught and applied. Li's early contributions to multifingered robotic grasping — particularly his formulations of grasp quality measures, force closure, and coordinated manipulation — helped establish the rigorous mathematical foundations that the field now takes for granted, collectively drawing hundreds of citations. His later reformulation of grasp analysis as linear matrix inequality problems provided computationally tractable solutions to long-standing challenges in dextrous manipulation. Beyond grasping, Li made significant contributions to nonholonomic motion planning, including the celebrated "falling cat" problem, illuminating how constrained mechanical systems can achieve complex reconfigurations. Across decades of research, Li's work exemplifies how deep mathematical insight can drive transformative advances in robotics.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1A Mathematical Introduction to Robotic Manipulation6,720 citations · 2017
- 2A Mathmematical Introduction to Robotic Manipulation2,672 citations · 1994
- 3Task-oriented optimal grasping by multifingered robot hands473 citations · 1988
- 4Motion of two rigid bodies with rolling constraint360 citations · 1990
- 5Grasping and Coordinated Manipulation by a Multifingered Robot Hand345 citations · 1989
- 6Nonholonomic Motion Planning275 citations · 2017
- 7Nonholonomic Motion Planning266 citations · 1993
- 8Grasp analysis as linear matrix inequality problems240 citations · 2003
- 9Grasp analysis as linear matrix inequality problems222 citations · 2000
- 10Near-optimal nonholonomic motion planning for a system of coupled rigid bodies170 citations · 1994