Bernard Espiau
École Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Paris, Institut national de recherche en sciences et technologies du numérique, Centre Inria de l'Université Grenoble Alpes, Institut de Recherche en Informatique et Systèmes Aléatoires, Centre de Recherche en Informatique, Université de Rennes, Centre de Mathématiques Appliquées
Papers
56
Total Citations
6,459
H-Index
27
About
Bernard Espiau stands as a pioneering figure in two transformative areas of robotics research: vision-based robot control and bipedal locomotion. Working primarily at INRIA in France, Espiau fundamentally shaped how robots perceive and interact with their environments through his landmark contributions to visual servoing — a paradigm in which camera systems are integrated directly into robotic control loops as dedicated task-specific sensors. His seminal 1992–1993 papers on visual servoing have collectively accumulated nearly 2,700 citations, establishing foundational frameworks for stability and robustness analysis that continue to guide researchers worldwide. His book *Robot Control: The Task Function Approach* (1991, 441 citations) offered a unifying theoretical architecture bridging computer science, mechanics, and automatic control. Equally influential is his systematic investigation of passive bipedal gait dynamics, particularly through the compass-like biped robot model, which illuminated the mechanics of limit cycles, stability, and bifurcation in human-like locomotion — work accumulating over 1,400 additional citations across multiple studies. Espiau also made important contributions to hand-eye calibration and robustness analysis in visual servoing. His legacy represents a rare combination of rigorous mathematical theory and practical engineering insight that has profoundly influenced modern autonomous robotics.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1A new approach to visual servoing in robotics1,357 citations · 1993
- 2A new approach to visual servoing in robotics1,330 citations · 1992
- 3A Study of the Passive Gait of a Compass-Like Biped Robot548 citations · 1998
- 4Robot Control: The Task Function Approach441 citations · 1991
- 5
- 6Compass-Like Biped Robot Part I : Stability and Bifurcation of Passive Gaits263 citations · 1996
- 7Limit cycles and their stability in a passive bipedal gait232 citations · 2002
- 8
- 9Robot Hand-Eye Calibration Using Structure-from-Motion171 citations · 2001
- 10Effect of camera calibration errors on visual servoing in robotics157 citations · 2005