Hi there! I’m David Blanco Mulero, currently a Post-doc at Institut de Robòtica i Informàtica Industrial (IRI, CSIC-UPC).

I received my Ph.D. in Robotics from Aalto University, advised by Prof. Ville Kyrki head of the Intelligent Robotics group.

My research focuses on learning and representation for manipulation, with a special focus on manipulation of deformable objects.

News

30.05.2024 - Our work Dynamic Manipulation of Deformable Objects using Imitation Learning with Adaptation to Hardware Constraints was accepted to IROS 2024! Check the website for more info!

19.04.2024 - I succesfully defended my Ph.D. Thesis! Big thanks to the opponent: Prof. Yiannis Demiris, to my supervisor Prof. Ville Kyrki and my advisor Prof. Gokhan Alcan.

31.01.2024 - Our work “Benchmarking the Sim-to-Real Gap in Cloth Manipulation” was accepted for publication at IEEE RA-L. This work presents a benchmark dataset for cloth manipulation, and evaluates the reality gap in MuJoCo, Bullet, Flex and SOFA using the proposed benchmark. Check the project website for more information.

08.01.2024 - Really exciting news! I just started a Research position at Institut de Robòtica i Informàtica Industrial (IRI, CSIC-UPC).

20.10.2023 - I was granted the Nokia PhD Scholarship grant (5000 Euros), to encourage the research of my PhD thesis.

Selected Publications

1. Blanco-Mulero, D., Barbany, O., Alcan, G., Colomé, A., Torras, C., & Kyrki, V. (2024). Benchmarking the Sim-to-Real Gap in Cloth Manipulation. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 9(3), 2981–2988. https://doi.org/10.1109/LRA.2024.3360814

   @article{blanco2024benchmarking,
     author = {Blanco-Mulero, David and Barbany, Oriol and Alcan, Gokhan and Colomé, Adrià and Torras, Carme and Kyrki, Ville},
     journal = {IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters},
     title = {Benchmarking the Sim-to-Real Gap in Cloth Manipulation},
     year = {2024},
     volume = {9},
     number = {3},
     pages = {2981-2988},
     doi = {10.1109/LRA.2024.3360814},
     website = {https://sites.google.com/view/cloth-sim2real-benchmark},
     group = {journal}
   }
   

2. Bettahar, H., Blanco-Mulero, D., Kyrki, V., Linder, M. B., & Zhou, Q. (2024). Rapid Improvement of Fiber Tensile Properties via In Situ Biomimetic Robotic Pulling and Bayesian Optimization. Advanced Intelligent Systems, 6(4), 2300610. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202300610

   @article{bettahar,
     author = {Bettahar, Houari and Blanco-Mulero, David and Kyrki, Ville and Linder, Markus B. and Zhou, Quan},
     title = {Rapid Improvement of Fiber Tensile Properties via In Situ Biomimetic Robotic Pulling and Bayesian Optimization},
     journal = {Advanced Intelligent Systems},
     volume = {6},
     number = {4},
     pages = {2300610},
     year = {2024},
     keywords = {Adaptive optimization designs, Bayesian optimizations, Fiber threading},
     doi = {https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202300610},
     group = {journal},
     link = {https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/aisy.202300610}
   }
   

1. Blanco-Mulero, D., Alcan, G., Abu-Dakka, F. J., & Kyrki, V. (2023). QDP: Learning to Sequentially Optimise Quasi-Static and Dynamic Manipulation Primitives for Robotic Cloth Manipulation. 2023 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 984–991. https://doi.org/10.1109/IROS55552.2023.10342002

   @article{blancomulero2023qdp,
     author = {Blanco-Mulero, David and Alcan, Gokhan and Abu-Dakka, Fares J. and Kyrki, Ville},
     booktitle = {2023 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)},
     title = {QDP: Learning to Sequentially Optimise Quasi-Static and Dynamic Manipulation Primitives for Robotic Cloth Manipulation},
     year = {2023},
     volume = {},
     number = {},
     pages = {984-991},
     doi = {10.1109/IROS55552.2023.10342002},
     group = {conference},
     website = {https://sites.google.com/view/qdp-srl}
   }
   

2. Rajani, C., Arndt, K., Blanco-Mulero, D., Luck, K. S., & Kyrki, V. (2023). Co-imitation: Learning Design and Behaviour by Imitation. Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence, 37(5), 6200–6208. https://doi.org/10.1609/aaai.v37i5.25764

   @article{rajani2023coimitation,
     title = {Co-imitation: Learning Design and Behaviour by Imitation},
     doi = {10.1609/aaai.v37i5.25764},
     booktitle = {Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence},
     volume = {37},
     number = {5},
     pages = {6200-6208},
     author = {Rajani, Chang and Arndt, Karol and Blanco-Mulero, David and Luck, Kevin Sebastian and Kyrki, Ville},
     year = {2023},
     month = jun,
     link = {https://ojs.aaai.org/index.php/AAAI/article/view/25764},
     website = {https://sites.google.com/view/co-imitation},
     group = {conference}
   }
   

1. Tuomainen*, N., Blanco-Mulero*, D., & Kyrki, V. (2022). Manipulation of Granular Materials by Learning Particle Interactions. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 7(2), 5663–5670. https://doi.org/10.1109/LRA.2022.3158382

   @article{tuomainen2022manipulation,
     author = {Tuomainen*, Neea and Blanco-Mulero*, David and Kyrki, Ville},
     journal = {IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters},
     title = {Manipulation of Granular Materials by Learning Particle Interactions},
     year = {2022},
     volume = {7},
     number = {2},
     pages = {5663-5670},
     doi = {10.1109/LRA.2022.3158382},
     link = {https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9732690?source=authoralert},
     group = {journal},
     website = {https://sites.google.com/view/granular-gnn-manipulation},
     code = {https://github.com/dblanm/gnn-manip}
   }
   

1. Hietala, J., Blanco-Mulero, D., Alcan, G., & Kyrki, V. (2022). Learning Visual Feedback Control for Dynamic Cloth Folding. 2022 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS).

   @article{hietala2022closing,
     title = {Learning Visual Feedback Control for Dynamic Cloth Folding},
     author = {Hietala, Julius and Blanco-Mulero, David and Alcan, Gokhan and Kyrki, Ville},
     booktitle = {2022 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)},
     year = {2022},
     link = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2109.04771},
     group = {conference},
     website = {https://sites.google.com/view/dynamic-cloth-folding/home},
     code = {https://github.com/hietalajulius/dynamic-cloth-folding}
   }