Max Robotics — Global Service Robot Directory + US Certification

About

Klaus Kriegel is a computational geometer whose research bridges theoretical algorithmic design and practical scientific applications. His most influential work centers on the **polygon exploration problem**, where he developed provably efficient online strategies for mobile robots navigating unknown environments using vision alone. His landmark 2001 paper on this topic, which has garnered 117 citations, established that a robot's exploratory tour need be no more than 26.5 times the length of an optimal offline watchman tour — a significant tightening of earlier bounds, including his own 1997 result of a 133-times competitive ratio. This progression across multiple publications reflects a sustained and rigorous refinement of the field, extended further in his 2013 work on polygons with holes. Beyond robotics and computational geometry, Kriegel made notable contributions to bioinformatics, applying geometric algorithms to the analysis of two-dimensional gel electrophoresis data in proteomics — a technically demanding problem requiring precise protein spot matching across gel images. His 2002 paper on this topic has accumulated 55 citations, demonstrating real-world impact. Taken together, Kriegel's body of work exemplifies how theoretical geometric insights can solve complex problems in both autonomous navigation and life sciences research.