USCarnegie Mellon UniversityRobotics Institute

Maxim Likhachev

Professor

Studies planning for robotics, including heuristic search for motion planning and manipulation.

Maxim Likhachev's lab at CMU works on planning, control & multi-robot systems and manipulation & robot learning. 42 papers since 2023. 5 PhD students and 4 master's students. 58 alumni, most often to Uber and Samsung. Applications close Dec 9.

papers, 2023–2026: 11/ year
at T1 venues: 0%
PhD students: 5
MS students: 4
alumni listed: 58

Papers by yearfrom the lab homepage, 2023–2026

11 papers2026 · T1 0 · collecting
10 papers2025 · T1 0
10 papers2024 · T1 0
11 papers2023 · T1 0

T1 venuesOther

Research focuspaper titles that use each topic's words

Planning, control & multi-robot systems25 papers
planning21 papers
Manipulation & robot learning19 papers
motion planning6 papers
robotics0 papers

Paper list

From the lab homepage.

202611 papers

"A Contact-Driven Framework for Manipulating in the Blind," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"A Contact-Driven Framework for Manipulating in the Blind,"
"Conflict-Based Search as a Protocol: A Multi-Agent Motion Planning Protocol for Heterogeneous Agents, Solvers, and Independent Tasks," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Conflict-Based Search as a Protocol: A Multi-Agent Motion Planning Protocol for Heterogeneous Agents, Solvers, and Independent Tasks,"
"Dynamic Agent Grouping ECBS: Scaling Windowed Multi-Agent Path Finding with Completeness Guarantees," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Dynamic Agent Grouping ECBS: Scaling Windowed Multi-Agent Path Finding with Completeness Guarantees,"
SoCS"Embodying Multi-Hand Manipulation Policies by Searching the Assignment and Null Spaces,"
"Front-to-Attractors: Modifying the Front-to-Front Heuristic in Bidirectional Search," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."Front-to-Attractors: Modifying the Front-to-Front Heuristic in Bidirectional Search,"
"Long-Horizon Multi-Object Rearrangement via Distilled Tree Search over Continuous Actions," Proceedings of the Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL)"Long-Horizon Multi-Object Rearrangement via Distilled Tree Search over Continuous Actions,"
"MOSAIC: Skill-Centric Manipulation Planning with Physics Simulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"MOSAIC: Skill-Centric Manipulation Planning with Physics Simulation,"
"Parallel Heuristic Search as Inference for Actor-Critic Reinforcement Learning Models," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Parallel Heuristic Search as Inference for Actor-Critic Reinforcement Learning Models,"
"SRMP: Search-Based Robot Motion Planning Library," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"SRMP: Search-Based Robot Motion Planning Library,"
"Think Fast: Real-Time Kinodynamic Belief-Space Planning for Projectile Interception," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Think Fast: Real-Time Kinodynamic Belief-Space Planning for Projectile Interception,"
"Thread-Ordered Parallel Greedy Best First Search," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Thread-Ordered Parallel Greedy Best First Search,"

202510 papers

"Attractor-Based Closed List Search: Sparsifying the Closed List for Efficient Memory-Constrained Planning," Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI)"Attractor-Based Closed List Search: Sparsifying the Closed List for Efficient Memory-Constrained Planning,"
"EMOA*: A Framework for Search-Based Multi-Objective Path Planning," Artificial Intelligence Journal (AIJ)"EMOA*: A Framework for Search-Based Multi-Objective Path Planning,"
"Lazy Heuristic Search for Solving POMDPs with Expensive-to-Compute Belief Transitions," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Lazy Heuristic Search for Solving POMDPs with Expensive-to-Compute Belief Transitions,"
"Multi-Robot Motion Planning with Diffusion Models," Proceedings of the International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR), ."Multi-Robot Motion Planning with Diffusion Models,"
"Optimal Interactive Learning on the Job via Facility Location Planning," Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)"Optimal Interactive Learning on the Job via Facility Location Planning,"
"Planning from Point Clouds over Continuous Actions for Multi-Object Rearrangement," Proceedings of the Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), ."Planning from Point Clouds over Continuous Actions for Multi-Object Rearrangement,"
"Real-Time LaCAM for Real-Time MAPF," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."Real-Time LaCAM for Real-Time MAPF,"
"Recovery Chaining: Learning Local Recovery Policies for Robust Manipulation," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"Recovery Chaining: Learning Local Recovery Policies for Robust Manipulation,"
"Windowed MAPF with Completeness Guarantees," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Windowed MAPF with Completeness Guarantees,"
"Work Smarter Not Harder: Simple Imitation Learning with CS-PIBT Outperforms Large Scale Imitation Learning for MAPF," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Work Smarter Not Harder: Simple Imitation Learning with CS-PIBT Outperforms Large Scale Imitation Learning for MAPF,"

202410 papers

"A Data Efficient Framework for Learning Local Heuristics," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."A Data Efficient Framework for Learning Local Heuristics,"
"Accelerating Search-Based Planning for Multi-Robot Manipulation by Leveraging Online-Generated Experiences," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), ."Accelerating Search-Based Planning for Multi-Robot Manipulation by Leveraging Online-Generated Experiences,"
"Constant-time Motion Planning with Anytime Refinement for Manipulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Constant-time Motion Planning with Anytime Refinement for Manipulation,"
"Implicit Graph Search for Planning on Graphs of Convex Sets," Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)"Implicit Graph Search for Planning on Graphs of Convex Sets,"
"Improved M4M: Faster and Richer Planning for Manipulation Among Movable Objects in Cluttered 3D Workspaces," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Improved M4M: Faster and Richer Planning for Manipulation Among Movable Objects in Cluttered 3D Workspaces,"
"Improving Learnt Local MAPF Policies with Heuristic Search," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Improving Learnt Local MAPF Policies with Heuristic Search,"
"MAPF in 3D Warehouses: Dataset and Analysis," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"MAPF in 3D Warehouses: Dataset and Analysis,"
"PINSAT: Parallelized Interleaving of Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization for Kinodynamic Motion Planning," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"PINSAT: Parallelized Interleaving of Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization for Kinodynamic Motion Planning,"
"Preprocessing-based Kinodynamic Motion Planning Framework for Intercepting Projectiles using a Robot Manipulator," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Preprocessing-based Kinodynamic Motion Planning Framework for Intercepting Projectiles using a Robot Manipulator,"
"Unconstraining Multi-Robot Manipulation: Enabling Arbitrary Constraints in ECBS with Bounded Sub-Optimality," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Unconstraining Multi-Robot Manipulation: Enabling Arbitrary Constraints in ECBS with Bounded Sub-Optimality,"

202311 papers

"A-ePASE: Anytime Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"A-ePASE: Anytime Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations,"
"Effective Integration of Weighted Cost-to-Go and Conflict Heuristic within Suboptimal CBS," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Effective Integration of Weighted Cost-to-Go and Conflict Heuristic within Suboptimal CBS,"
"Efficient Recovery Learning using Model Predictive Meta-Reasoning," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Efficient Recovery Learning using Model Predictive Meta-Reasoning,"
"GePASE: Generalized Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"GePASE: Generalized Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations,"
"Learning Local Heuristics for Search-Based Navigation Planning," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), ."Learning Local Heuristics for Search-Based Navigation Planning,"
"Operating with Inaccurate Models by Integrating Control-Level Discrepancy Information into Planning," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Operating with Inaccurate Models by Integrating Control-Level Discrepancy Information into Planning,"
"Planning for Complex Non-prehensile Manipulation Among Movable Objects by Interleaving Multi-Agent Pathfinding and Physics-Based Simulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Planning for Complex Non-prehensile Manipulation Among Movable Objects by Interleaving Multi-Agent Pathfinding and Physics-Based Simulation,"
"Planning for Manipulation among Movable Objects: Deciding Which Objects Go Where, in What Order, and How," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Planning for Manipulation among Movable Objects: Deciding Which Objects Go Where, in What Order, and How,"
"Preprocessing-Based Planning for Utilizing Contacts in Semi-Structured High Precision Insertion Tasks," IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L)"Preprocessing-Based Planning for Utilizing Contacts in Semi-Structured High Precision Insertion Tasks,"
"Runahead A*: Speculative Parallelism for A* with Slow Expansions," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Runahead A*: Speculative Parallelism for A* with Slow Expansions,"
"Torque-Limited Manipulation Planning through Contact by Interleaving Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Torque-Limited Manipulation Planning through Contact by Interleaving Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization,"

Where alumni went58 listed, 75% to industry

Industry 3Academia 1

Most often to

Uber
Samsung

Also to

Lehigh University

Apply to CMUFall 2027

Dec 9

CMU SCS Computer Science PhD

Round: Single round
Opens: Sep 9, 2026
GRE: See program page
English: TOEFL / IELTS / Duolingo (F-1/J-1 non-native speakers)
Fee: USD 100 (USD 80 by early deadline)

Program page

Confirmed on the program page.

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Data

Some numbers could not be verified:

The lab site and the paper record do not agree.

Collected: Oct 25, 2026
Verified: Oct 26, 2026
Papers: The lab homepage
Members: Lab homepage
Alumni: Lab homepage

Tiers are venue classifications, not lab rankings.

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CMUcloses Dec 9

Paper list

From the lab homepage.

202611 papers

"A Contact-Driven Framework for Manipulating in the Blind," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"A Contact-Driven Framework for Manipulating in the Blind,"
"Conflict-Based Search as a Protocol: A Multi-Agent Motion Planning Protocol for Heterogeneous Agents, Solvers, and Independent Tasks," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Conflict-Based Search as a Protocol: A Multi-Agent Motion Planning Protocol for Heterogeneous Agents, Solvers, and Independent Tasks,"
"Dynamic Agent Grouping ECBS: Scaling Windowed Multi-Agent Path Finding with Completeness Guarantees," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Dynamic Agent Grouping ECBS: Scaling Windowed Multi-Agent Path Finding with Completeness Guarantees,"
SoCS"Embodying Multi-Hand Manipulation Policies by Searching the Assignment and Null Spaces,"
"Front-to-Attractors: Modifying the Front-to-Front Heuristic in Bidirectional Search," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."Front-to-Attractors: Modifying the Front-to-Front Heuristic in Bidirectional Search,"
"Long-Horizon Multi-Object Rearrangement via Distilled Tree Search over Continuous Actions," Proceedings of the Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL)"Long-Horizon Multi-Object Rearrangement via Distilled Tree Search over Continuous Actions,"
"MOSAIC: Skill-Centric Manipulation Planning with Physics Simulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"MOSAIC: Skill-Centric Manipulation Planning with Physics Simulation,"
"Parallel Heuristic Search as Inference for Actor-Critic Reinforcement Learning Models," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Parallel Heuristic Search as Inference for Actor-Critic Reinforcement Learning Models,"
"SRMP: Search-Based Robot Motion Planning Library," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"SRMP: Search-Based Robot Motion Planning Library,"
"Think Fast: Real-Time Kinodynamic Belief-Space Planning for Projectile Interception," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Think Fast: Real-Time Kinodynamic Belief-Space Planning for Projectile Interception,"
"Thread-Ordered Parallel Greedy Best First Search," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Thread-Ordered Parallel Greedy Best First Search,"

202510 papers

"Attractor-Based Closed List Search: Sparsifying the Closed List for Efficient Memory-Constrained Planning," Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI)"Attractor-Based Closed List Search: Sparsifying the Closed List for Efficient Memory-Constrained Planning,"
"EMOA*: A Framework for Search-Based Multi-Objective Path Planning," Artificial Intelligence Journal (AIJ)"EMOA*: A Framework for Search-Based Multi-Objective Path Planning,"
"Lazy Heuristic Search for Solving POMDPs with Expensive-to-Compute Belief Transitions," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Lazy Heuristic Search for Solving POMDPs with Expensive-to-Compute Belief Transitions,"
"Multi-Robot Motion Planning with Diffusion Models," Proceedings of the International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR), ."Multi-Robot Motion Planning with Diffusion Models,"
"Optimal Interactive Learning on the Job via Facility Location Planning," Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)"Optimal Interactive Learning on the Job via Facility Location Planning,"
"Planning from Point Clouds over Continuous Actions for Multi-Object Rearrangement," Proceedings of the Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), ."Planning from Point Clouds over Continuous Actions for Multi-Object Rearrangement,"
"Real-Time LaCAM for Real-Time MAPF," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."Real-Time LaCAM for Real-Time MAPF,"
"Recovery Chaining: Learning Local Recovery Policies for Robust Manipulation," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"Recovery Chaining: Learning Local Recovery Policies for Robust Manipulation,"
"Windowed MAPF with Completeness Guarantees," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Windowed MAPF with Completeness Guarantees,"
"Work Smarter Not Harder: Simple Imitation Learning with CS-PIBT Outperforms Large Scale Imitation Learning for MAPF," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Work Smarter Not Harder: Simple Imitation Learning with CS-PIBT Outperforms Large Scale Imitation Learning for MAPF,"

202410 papers

"A Data Efficient Framework for Learning Local Heuristics," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), ."A Data Efficient Framework for Learning Local Heuristics,"
"Accelerating Search-Based Planning for Multi-Robot Manipulation by Leveraging Online-Generated Experiences," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), ."Accelerating Search-Based Planning for Multi-Robot Manipulation by Leveraging Online-Generated Experiences,"
"Constant-time Motion Planning with Anytime Refinement for Manipulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Constant-time Motion Planning with Anytime Refinement for Manipulation,"
"Implicit Graph Search for Planning on Graphs of Convex Sets," Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)"Implicit Graph Search for Planning on Graphs of Convex Sets,"
"Improved M4M: Faster and Richer Planning for Manipulation Among Movable Objects in Cluttered 3D Workspaces," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Improved M4M: Faster and Richer Planning for Manipulation Among Movable Objects in Cluttered 3D Workspaces,"
"Improving Learnt Local MAPF Policies with Heuristic Search," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Improving Learnt Local MAPF Policies with Heuristic Search,"
"MAPF in 3D Warehouses: Dataset and Analysis," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"MAPF in 3D Warehouses: Dataset and Analysis,"
"PINSAT: Parallelized Interleaving of Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization for Kinodynamic Motion Planning," Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)"PINSAT: Parallelized Interleaving of Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization for Kinodynamic Motion Planning,"
"Preprocessing-based Kinodynamic Motion Planning Framework for Intercepting Projectiles using a Robot Manipulator," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Preprocessing-based Kinodynamic Motion Planning Framework for Intercepting Projectiles using a Robot Manipulator,"
"Unconstraining Multi-Robot Manipulation: Enabling Arbitrary Constraints in ECBS with Bounded Sub-Optimality," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"Unconstraining Multi-Robot Manipulation: Enabling Arbitrary Constraints in ECBS with Bounded Sub-Optimality,"

202311 papers

"A-ePASE: Anytime Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"A-ePASE: Anytime Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations,"
"Effective Integration of Weighted Cost-to-Go and Conflict Heuristic within Suboptimal CBS," Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)"Effective Integration of Weighted Cost-to-Go and Conflict Heuristic within Suboptimal CBS,"
"Efficient Recovery Learning using Model Predictive Meta-Reasoning," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Efficient Recovery Learning using Model Predictive Meta-Reasoning,"
"GePASE: Generalized Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations," Proceedings of the International Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS)"GePASE: Generalized Edge-Based Parallel A* for Slow Evaluations,"
"Learning Local Heuristics for Search-Based Navigation Planning," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), ."Learning Local Heuristics for Search-Based Navigation Planning,"
"Operating with Inaccurate Models by Integrating Control-Level Discrepancy Information into Planning," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Operating with Inaccurate Models by Integrating Control-Level Discrepancy Information into Planning,"
"Planning for Complex Non-prehensile Manipulation Among Movable Objects by Interleaving Multi-Agent Pathfinding and Physics-Based Simulation," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Planning for Complex Non-prehensile Manipulation Among Movable Objects by Interleaving Multi-Agent Pathfinding and Physics-Based Simulation,"
"Planning for Manipulation among Movable Objects: Deciding Which Objects Go Where, in What Order, and How," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Planning for Manipulation among Movable Objects: Deciding Which Objects Go Where, in What Order, and How,"
"Preprocessing-Based Planning for Utilizing Contacts in Semi-Structured High Precision Insertion Tasks," IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L)"Preprocessing-Based Planning for Utilizing Contacts in Semi-Structured High Precision Insertion Tasks,"
"Runahead A*: Speculative Parallelism for A* with Slow Expansions," Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS)"Runahead A*: Speculative Parallelism for A* with Slow Expansions,"
"Torque-Limited Manipulation Planning through Contact by Interleaving Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization," Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)"Torque-Limited Manipulation Planning through Contact by Interleaving Graph Search and Trajectory Optimization,"

Similar labsnearest by research summary

CNPeking

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Planning, control & multi-robot systems

0 T1

DETUM

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Human-robot interaction & assistive robots

6 T1

USUT Austin

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Planning, control & multi-robot systems

27 T1

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At a glance

Papers by yearfrom the lab homepage, 2023–2026

Research focuspaper titles that use each topic's words

Paper list

202611 papers

202510 papers

202410 papers

202311 papers

Where alumni went58 listed, 75% to industry

Most often to

Also to

Apply to CMUFall 2027

Similar labsnearest by research summary

Your notes

Data

At a glance

Papers by yearfrom the lab homepage, 2023–2026

Research focuspaper titles that use each topic's words

Paper list

202611 papers

202510 papers

202410 papers

202311 papers

Where alumni went58 listed, 75% to industry

Most often to

Also to

Apply to CMUFall 2027

Similar labsnearest by research summary

Your notes

Data