Yiqi Zhao ☕️
Yiqi Zhao
赵一淇

PhD Candidate, Computer Science

University of Southern California

About Me

Yiqi (Nick) Zhao is a PhD Candidate in Computer Science at the University of Southern California (USC). He is advised by Professor Jyo Deshmukh and Professor Yue Wang. He is honored to be a member of the CPS-VIDA lab and the PSI Lab at USC. He also works closely with Professor Lars Lindemann. His research focuses on multirobot design and verification.

"One day, I just wanted to keep swimming, until the sea turned blue." — Yu Hua

「有一天我就想一直游，我想一直游到海水变蓝」——余华

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Interests
  • Robotics
  • Cyber-Physical Systems
  • Formal Methods
  • Systems and Control Theory
Education

  • PhD, Computer Science

    University of Southern California

  • MS, Computer Science

    University of Southern California

  • BSc, magna cum laude, Honors in Computer Science

    Vanderbilt University

Featured Publications
Rolling-WAM: World Action Models with Rolling Imagination

Yinghua Zhou*, Junjie Ye*, Yiqi Zhao, Hao Dong, Celina Shiyu Wang, Ruohai Ge, Tingyi Yang, Basile Van Hoorick, Gaurav S. Sukhatme, Vitor Campagnolo Guizilini†, Yue Wang†

Sep 24, 2026

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Safety-aware Model Predictive Path Integral Control with Signal Temporal Logic
Safety-aware Model Predictive Path Integral Control with Signal Temporal Logic

Yiqi Zhao, Taekyung Kim, Hideki Okamoto, Bardh Hoxha, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Lars Lindemann, Georgios Fainekos

Aug 24, 2026

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Logic-VLA: A Temporal Logic Conditioned Vision-Language-Action Model
Logic-VLA: A Temporal Logic Conditioned Vision-Language-Action Model

Celina Shiyu Wang, Yiqi Zhao†, Junjie Ye, Yue Wang, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh†

IROS 2026 ReS AI Workshop (Oral).

Aug 20, 2026

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DUET: Dual-Robot Understanding via Efficient Teaching

Yiqi Zhao*, Ruohai Ge*, Celina Shiyu Wang, Junjie Ye, Muchen Xu, Minhao Li, Sergey Zakharov, Basile Van Hoorick, Vitor Campagnolo Guizilini, Leonidas Guibas, Gaurav S. Sukhatme, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Yue Wang

🏆 Best Paper Finalist, IROS 2026 PhysCollaBot Workshop

🏆 Best Contribution, IROS 2026 RWCMRC Workshop

Jun 14, 2026

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STL-GO: Spatio-Temporal Logic with Graph Operators for Distributed Systems with Multiple Network Topologies
STL-GO: Spatio-Temporal Logic with Graph Operators for Distributed Systems with Multiple Network Topologies

Yiqi Zhao*, Xinyi Yu*, Bardh Hoxha, Georgios Fainekos, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Lars Lindemann

the ACM SIGBED International Conference on Embedded Software, 2025.

Jul 20, 2025

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Distributionally Robust Predictive Runtime Verification under Spatio-Temporal Logic Specifications

Yiqi Zhao, Emily Zhu, Bardh Hoxha, Georgios Fainekos, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Lars Lindemann

ACM Transactions on Cyber-Physical Systems.

Apr 3, 2025

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Robust Conformal Prediction for STL Runtime Verification under Distribution Shift
Robust Conformal Prediction for STL Runtime Verification under Distribution Shift

Yiqi Zhao, Bardh Hoxha, Georgios Fainekos, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Lars Lindemann

🏆 Best Paper Finalist, ICCPS 2024

15th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Cyber-Physical Systems, 2024.

Nov 16, 2023

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Fairguard: Harness Logic-based Fairness Rules in Smart Cities
Fairguard: Harness Logic-based Fairness Rules in Smart Cities

Yiqi Zhao, Ziyan An, Xuqing Gao, Ayan Mukhopadhyay, Meiyi Ma

8th ACM/IEEE Conference on Internet of Things Design and Implementation, 2023.

Feb 22, 2023

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Recent Publications
Yinghua Zhou*, Junjie Ye*, Yiqi Zhao, Hao Dong, Celina Shiyu Wang, Ruohai Ge, Tingyi Yang, Basile Van Hoorick, Gaurav S. Sukhatme, Vitor Campagnolo Guizilini†, Yue Wang† (2026). Rolling-WAM: World Action Models with Rolling Imagination.
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Kehan Long, Yiqi Zhao, Pol Mestres, Lars Lindemann, Nikolay Atanasov, Jorge Cortés (2026). A Unified Perspective on Conformal Prediction and Wasserstein Distributionally Robust Optimization for Uncertainty Quantification. arXiv preprint arXiv:2608.29789.
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Yiqi Zhao, Taekyung Kim, Hideki Okamoto, Bardh Hoxha, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Lars Lindemann, Georgios Fainekos (2026). Safety-aware Model Predictive Path Integral Control with Signal Temporal Logic. arXiv preprint arXiv:2608.23972.
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Celina Shiyu Wang, Yiqi Zhao†, Junjie Ye, Yue Wang, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh† (2026). Logic-VLA: A Temporal Logic Conditioned Vision-Language-Action Model.
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Yiqi Zhao*, Ruohai Ge*, Celina Shiyu Wang, Junjie Ye, Muchen Xu, Minhao Li, Sergey Zakharov, Basile Van Hoorick, Vitor Campagnolo Guizilini, Leonidas Guibas, Gaurav S. Sukhatme, Jyotirmoy V. Deshmukh, Yue Wang (2026). DUET: Dual-Robot Understanding via Efficient Teaching.
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Experience

  1. Toyota Research Institute of North America logo

    Research and Development Intern

    Toyota Research Institute of North America
    Worked on cyber-physical systems research at the Future Research Department; Conducted research on Model Predictive Path Integral (paper coming soon). Supervisors: Georgios Fainekos, Bardh Hoxha.
  2. ADP logo

    Application Development Intern

    ADP
    Full stack API development for the Autopay Group within the Global Product & Tech group. Supervisor: Jim Farber.
Awards
Best Contribution at the IROS 2026 RWCMRC Workshop
IROS 2026 Workshop on Real-World Challenges in Multi-Robot Cooperation: The Power of Heterogeneity and Diversity (RWCMRC) ∙ 2026
Awarded for the paper “DUET: Dual-Robot Understanding via Efficient Teaching”.
Best Paper Finalist at the IROS 2026 PhysCollaBot Workshop
IROS 2026 Workshop on Physical Collaboration and Interaction in Multi-Robot Systems (PhysCollaBot) ∙ 2026
Awarded for the paper “DUET: Dual-Robot Understanding via Efficient Teaching”.
ICCPS Best Paper Award Finalist
15th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Cyber-Physical Systems ∙ 2024
Awarded for the paper “Robust Conformal Prediction for STL Runtime Verification under Distribution Shift”.
Viterbi School of Engineering Fellowship
Viterbi School of Engineering, USC ∙ 2023
Awarded to selected incoming PhD students at the Viterbi School of Engineering, USC.
VISE Award (Vanderbilt Institute for Surgery and Engineering Summer Fellowship)
Vanderbilt Institute for Surgery and Engineering ∙ 2021
Awarded for the paid fellowship at the Vanderbilt Institute for Surgery and Engineering Summer Fellows Program.