Nonlinear MPC

MPC: Model Predictive Control

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Overview

NMPC plans a sequence of control actions by predicting how a nonlinear system will evolve, applying the first action, and replanning as new measurements arrive. Common approaches solve the resulting optimization with methods such as sequential quadratic or convex programming, while sampling-based methods explore candidate action sequences; learned models and reduced-order dynamics can make prediction more practical. Safety and robustness are addressed with tools including control barrier functions, reachability bounds, uncertainty-aware constraint tightening, and state estimation. A central challenge is achieving fast, feasible optimization with useful prediction horizons while retaining reliable constraint satisfaction under model error, disturbances, and changing environments.

Latest papers

CardsList

83 papers12 papers in the last four weeks, up 140% on the four weeks before. 0.1% of all new papers.

  1. Accelerating Nonlinear MPC by Behavior Cloning with Separated Timescales: Application to Nuclear Reactor Load-Following

    Oct 28, 2026Perceval Beja-Battais, Alain Grosset{ê}te, Nicolas VayatisBehavior CloningNonlinear MPC

    CB

  2. Distributed Predictive Flocking for a Swarm of Miniature Vibration-Driven Robots in a Confined Arena

    Oct 26, 2026Prajol Shrestha, Siddhant Mohapatra, Filip Novkoski +4Swarm RoboticsMulti-Robot Coordination

    Pattern Recognition Lab, Department of Computer Science, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, 91058, Erlangen, Germany · PULS, Institute for Theoretical Physics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, 91058, Erlangen, Germany · GRASP, Institute of Physics B5a, University of Liège, B4000, Liège, Belgium +1

  3. ISB-NMPC: Interception-Oriented Spherical-Bearing Nonlinear Model Predictive Control for Quadrotors

    Oct 26, 2026Li Hong, Linkai Liu, Xiangyu Ren +6Quadrotor ControlNonlinear MPC

    Li Hong, Chen Min, and Yujun Zhang are with Shen Yuan Honors College, Beihang University, Beijing, China · Linkai Liu, Xiangyu Ren, Shuli Lv, Dingchen Zeng, and Quan Quan are with the School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, China. · Chunjiang Wu is with the Hangzhou International Innovation Institute, Beihang University, Hangzhou, China.

  4. Certified Neural Approximation of Robust Nonlinear Model Predictive Control

    Oct 21, 2026Hendrik Alsmeier, Maik Pfefferkorn, Rolf FindeisenNeural Network ControlNonlinear MPC

    Control and Cyber-Physical Systems Laboratory, Technical University of Darmstadt, Landgraf-Georg-Str. 4, 64283 Darmstadt, Germany

  5. Full-Order Safety for Nonlinear Reduced-Order MPC

    Oct 13, 2026Luis Pabon, Johannes Köhler, Revant Kasichainula +1Model Predictive ControlNonlinear MPC

    Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Stanford University, USA · Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London, UK

  6. Task-Space Motion-Force Nonlinear Model Predictive Control for Precise and Compliant Control under Uncertainties

    Oct 12, 2026Quang-Nam Nguyen, Ludovic RighettiRobotic ControlNonlinear MPC

    Machines in Motion Laboratory, Center for Robotics and Embodied Intelligence, New York University (NYU), USA. · Artificial and Natural Intelligence Toulouse Institute (ANITI), France.

  7. MSC: Multi-Stage Caster-aware Control Framework with Uncertainty-Aware NMPC and RL-based Execution Layer

    Oct 12, 2026Jinho Park, Jeongtae Lee, Jeonghyeok Lim +2Robot Trajectory TrackingNonlinear MPC

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, KAIST, Daejeon, Republic of Korea

  8. A Scalable Learned Iterative Solver for Nonlinear MPC via Temporal Decomposition

    Oct 9, 2026Lukas Lüken, Sergio LuciaLearning to OptimizeNonlinear MPC

    Chair of Process Automation Systems, TU Dortmund University, Emil-Figge Straße 70, Dortmund, 44227, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

  9. NMPP: Nonlinear Model Predictive Planning for Agile UAV Flight in Cluttered Environments

    Oct 6, 2026Ondřej Procházka, Juraj Pauko, Robert Pěnička +1Constrained Motion PlanningNonlinear MPC

    Multi-robot Systems Group, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic

  10. Energy-Aware Path Following: Comparative Analysis of Reinforcement Learning and NMPC for Electric Vehicles

    Oct 6, 2026Mohamed Sabaa, Mostafa EmamRobot Trajectory TrackingNonlinear MPC

    Computer Science Department, Najran University, Najran, Saudi Arabia · Institute of Applied Mathematics and Scientific Computing, University of the Bundeswehr Munich, Neubiberg, 85579, Germany

  11. Structured Representation Learning for Behavior Cloning: How can we learn to safely control a nuclear power plant?

    Oct 5, 2026Perceval Beja-Battais, Alain Grosset{ê}te, Nicolas VayatisRepresentation LearningSafety-Critical Control

    CB

  12. Reachability-Guided Sequential Quadratic Programming-Guarded Model Predictive Path Integral for Safe Nonlinear Predictive Control

    Oct 3, 2026Alexandre Didier, Jason J. Choi, Namhoon Cho +2Model Predictive ControlNonlinear MPC

    Institute for Dynamic Systems and Control, ETH Zurich, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland. · Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA. · Department of Aerospace Engineering, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Republic of Korea. +1

  13. DR-IPC: Disturbance-Resilient Integrated Planning and Control for LiDAR-Based Quadrotor Navigation

    Oct 2, 2026Peng Liu, Jingyan Wang, Qipeng Ye +5Disturbance RejectionUAV Navigation

    School of Automation, Key Laboratory of Measurement and Control of CSE, Ministry of Education, Institute of Intelligent Unmanned Systems, Southeast University, Nanjing 210096, China. · School of Electrical Engineering and Automation, Xiamen University of Technology, Xiamen 361024, China. · Department of Computer Science, University College London, London, WC1E 6BT, UK.

  14. SD-DPC: Sparse Dictionary Differentiable Predictive Control

    Oct 1, 2026Ali Reza Daneshvar Garmroodi, Jan DrgoňaPolicy LearningModel Predictive Control

    Concordia University, Montreal, QC H3G1M8, Canada. · Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA.

  15. RL-Guided PAC-NMPC for Probabilistically-Safe Perception-Based Navigation in Unknown Environments

    Sep 30, 2026Adam Polevoy, Dillon Capalongo, Katherine Tang +3RL for RoboticsNonlinear MPC

    Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD 20723, USA. · Department of Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA.

  16. Onboard Wind-Preview Model Predictive Control Using Pitot-Static Sensing for Multirotor UAVs

    Sep 25, 2026Bas Meere, Eline Wisse, Laurens Vousten +4Quadrotor ControlRobust Control

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5612 AE Eindhoven, The Netherlands, in the Control Systems Technology group · Department of Mechanical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5612 AE Eindhoven, The Netherlands, in the Robotics group

  17. Mobile Multi-Robot Navigation under Runtime Uncertainty via Koopman Operator Learning and Nonlinear Model Predictive Control

    Sep 12, 2026Xiaobin Zhang, Konstantinos KarydisRobot NavigationNonlinear MPC

    University of California, Riverside, Riverside CA 92551, USA

  18. Contact-Aware Incremental Model Predictive Control for an Underactuated Aerial Manipulator

    Sep 10, 2026Darwin Liu, Tamas Keviczky, Sihao SunNonlinear MPCForce-Controlled Robotic Manipulation

    Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Delft University of Technology

  19. Multi-Reference Path Tracking Control for an Agricultural Tractor with Nonlinear Model Predictive Control

    Sep 4, 2026Marcel Moll, Timo OksanenRobot Trajectory TrackingAgricultural Robotics

    Chair of Agrimechatronics, Munich Institute of Robotics and Machine Intelligence (MIRMI), Technical University of Munich, Germany

  20. Koopman-Based Robust Model Predictive Control for Nonlinear Systems with Stochastic Intermittent Measurements

    Sep 2, 2026Guanhua Liu, Tong Wu, Lixian Zhang +2Nonlinear MPCModel Predictive Control

    State Key Laboratory of Robotics and Systems, Harbin Institute of Technology, China · School of Astronautics, Harbin Institute of Technology, China · Nanyang Environment and Water Research Institute (NEWRI), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

  21. Distributed Model-Based Diffusion: Finite Horizon Contraction under Bounded Delay

    Aug 27, 2026Seth Golembeski, Keith L. Gibson, Alexander Gross +2Multi-Agent ControlMulti-Agent Coordination

    School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA · Sandia National Laboratories · School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA

  22. Nonlinear Model Predictive Control for Trajectory Tracking of Differentially Flat Fixed-Wing Aerial Systems

    Aug 21, 2026Nishanth Bobbili, Pratyaksh Rao, Luca Morando +2Differential FlatnessRobot Trajectory Tracking

    Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.

  23. Effector-Centric NMPC of Tiltable-Multirotors for Offset-Free Omnidirectional Aerial Manipulation

    Aug 18, 2026Jinjie Li, Yicheng Chen, Johannes Kübel +3Aerial ManipulationAerial Robotics

    All authors are with the DRAGON Lab, Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan

  24. Nonlinear Model Predictive Control via Sequential Convex Programming for Drone-to-Drone Docking

    Aug 11, 2026Neeraj Balachandar, Shriram Hari, Vishnu R. UnniAerial RoboticsTrajectory Optimization

    Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, Telangana, India

  25. Nonlinear Model Predictive Control of a Robotic Soft Esophagus

    Aug 10, 2026Dipankar Bhattacharya, Ryman Hashem, Leo K. Cheng +1Nonlinear MPCSoft Robotics

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Auckland, Auckland 1010, New Zealand · Auckland Bioengineering Institute, University of Auckland, Auckland 1010, New Zealand

  26. Real-Time Nonlinear MPC via Sequential Quadratic Programming with Structure-Exploiting ADMM and Interior-Point Methods for Underactuated Double-Pendulum Swing-Up

    Aug 10, 2026Nick Karydakis, Konstantinos ChatzilygeroudisRobotic ControlNonlinear MPC

    Laboratory of Automation and Robotics (LAR) in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Patras, GR-26504 Patras, Greece

  27. CUDA MPC: A GPU-Native Solver for Model Predictive Control

    Aug 4, 2026Babak Akbari, Melissa GreeffGPU Kernel OptimizationGPU Acceleration

    Robora Lab, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Queen's University, Kingston, ON, Canada

  28. Amortising Trajectory Optimisation for Residual MPC via Implicit Contact Differentiation

    Jul 27, 2026Daniel Layeghi, Thomas Corbères, Calum Arnott +4Trajectory OptimizationAutomatic Differentiation

    School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

  29. Moving-Horizon Estimation and Nonlinear Model Predictive Control of Cable-Driven Soft Manipulators

    Jul 27, 2026Lingxiao Xun, Haihong Li, Gang ZhengNonlinear MPCMoving Horizon Estimation

  30. BC-NMPC: Battery-Constrained NMPC with Propulsion Prediction and Replanning for High-Speed Flight

    Jul 26, 2026Parakh M. Gupta, Matej Mihulka, Matej Novosad +2Robot Trajectory TrackingNonlinear MPC

    Multi-robot Systems Group, Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic