Gilles Le Chenadec

About

Gilles Le Chenadec is a robotics researcher specializing in the control and guidance of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) using deep reinforcement learning (DRL). His work addresses the fundamental challenges of operating in the marine environment—a highly unstructured, uncertain setting with unpredictable external disturbances. Le Chenadec’s major contributions include developing a DRL-based framework for simultaneous control and guidance of AUVs for waypoint tracking, as demonstrated in his most-cited paper (18 citations). He has also pioneered fault-tolerant control strategies, using DRL for control reallocation to help AUVs recover from actuator faults, a critical capability for maintaining stability and performance in hostile conditions. Notably, his recent work on sim-to-real transfer (1 citation) provides a practical methodology for deploying these DRL models on physical vehicles, bridging the gap between simulation and real-world application. Le Chenadec’s research is at the forefront of making AUVs more robust, autonomous, and resilient, with direct implications for underwater exploration, inspection, and defense.

Research Focus

Key Achievements

Top Papers

1. 1
   Simultaneous Control and Guidance of an AUV Based on Soft Actor–Critic

   18 citations · 2022
2. 2
   Control Reallocation Using Deep Reinforcement Learning for Actuator Fault Recovery of an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle

   2 citations · 2025
3. 3
   Sim-to-Real Transfer for AUV Fault Control with Deep Reinforcement Learning

   1 citations · 2025

Key Collaborators

Contact & Links