Contact

Franklin Antonio Hall Rm 3202

(858) 822-4778 

yip@ucsd.edu

Short Bio

Michael Yip is an Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at UC San Diego, IEEE RAS Distinguished Lecturer, Hellman Fellow,  Senior Member of the IEEE and the National Academy of Inventors, and Director of the Advanced Robotics and Controls Laboratory (ARCLab). 

His group currently focuses on surgical robots, biomimetic design, and robot learning. His research has received several best paper awards and nominations at ICRA and IROS and RA-L, and he has been recognized by the NSF CAREER award and the NIH Trailblazer award. Several of his research has led to founded startups, and he was named the Faculty Innovator of the Year at UCSD in 2024.

Dr. Yip was previously a Disney Research in 2014 and Amazon Robotics in 2018. He received a B.Sc. in Mechatronics Engineering from the University of Waterloo, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of British Columbia, and a Ph.D. in Bioengineering from Stanford University.

Lab Website

Advanced Robotics and Controls Laboratory (ARCLab)

Publication List

Publications →

Complete CV

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Areas of Research

• Robot Manipulation in Dynamic Environments

• Reinforcement Learning for Robot Control

• Continuum and Snake-like Robots

• Robotic Surgery
  
  

Education

• Ph.D. in Bioengineering, Stanford University

• M.Sc. in Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of British Columbia

• B.Sc., in Mechatronics Engineering, University of Waterloo
  
  

Previous Positions

• Stanford University, Visiting Professor in Mechanical Engineering 2019

• Amazon Robotics Machine Learning and Computer Vision Group, Visiting Professor, 2018 

• Disney Research, Research Associate, 2014

• Harvard University, Research Assistant, 2008

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Research Assistant, 2007

• Massachusetts General Hospital, Research Assistant, 2006
  
  

Select Awards

• UCSD Faculty Innovator of the Year, 2024

• Member, National Academy of Inventors (NAI), 2024

• NIH Trailblazer Award, 2021

• NSF CAREER Award, 2021

• Best Paper Finalist, Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2021

• Elevated to IEEE Senior Member, 2021

• Best Paper Award for Cognitive Robotic Surgery, Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2020

• IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Distinguished Lecturer, 2018

• Hellman Fellow, 2017

• Outstanding Researcher Award, NIH Center for Simulation in Rehab. Research 2017

• Inaugural Best Paper Award, IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 2017

• Best Paper Finalist, Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2015

• Best Paper Award for Advances in Flexible Robotics for Medical Interventions,  Int. Conf. on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 2014
  
  

Service

• Senior Program Committee, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)

• Robotics, Science, and Systems (RSS), Primary Area Chair

• Associate Editor, IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L) 

• Associate Editor, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) 

• IEEE Haptics Symposium, Sponsorship Chair NSF

• Panel Reviewer – NSF:ENG: National Robotics Initiative 2.0, NSF:IIS: Robust Intelligence, NIH: National Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering 

• Contributing Author, US Congressional Robotics Roadmap 2016 & 2020