Jack W. Langelaan
Papers
6
Total Citations
131
H-Index
5
About
Jack W. Langelaan is a leading researcher in autonomous flight, with a focus on enabling small robotic aircraft to perform unprecedented feats of endurance and agility. His foundational work on autonomous soaring, particularly through the AutoSOAR project, has demonstrated how small unmanned aerial vehicles can exploit atmospheric thermals to dramatically extend their range and endurance, much like birds of prey. The two-part AutoSOAR series (2017–2018), with over 75 combined citations, details both the autonomy algorithms and successful flight-test hardware, showcasing his ability to bridge theory and practice. Langelaan’s broader impact is captured in his highly cited 2009 paper on enabling new missions for robotic aircraft, which has shaped how researchers think about long-duration flight in cluttered environments. More recently, he has pioneered bio-inspired inverted landing strategies for small aerial robots, drawing inspiration from flies and bats. His work using deep reinforcement learning and policy gradient methods to trigger and control rotational maneuvers for upside-down landing (2020–2023) represents a significant leap in aerobatic flight control. With over 130 total citations, Langelaan’s contributions continue to push the boundaries of what small autonomous aircraft can achieve.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1The AutoSOAR autonomous soaring aircraft, part 1: Autonomy algorithms43 citations · 2018
- 2Enabling New Missions for Robotic Aircraft35 citations · 2009
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