Mingdong Li

mlidr at connect dot ust dot hk

I am a Research Scientist at the Humanoid Lab of Anker Innovations, working on robot data systems, multimodal manipulation, and tactile sensing. I received my Ph.D. in Robotics and Autonomous Systems from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), supervised by Prof. Yiwen Wang.

Before joining HKUST, I received my M.Eng. from Zhejiang University in 2021 and B.Eng. from Tongji University in 2018, both in Mechanical Engineering.

My interests span brain-machine interfaces, NeuroAI, cognitive analysis, and robot learning. I study interpretable models of neural population coding and brain-inspired frameworks that connect biological and artificial intelligence.

CV/ 中文简历/ Google Scholar/ GitHub

Updates

Jun 2026 One paper was accepted by IEEE SMC.
Aug 2025 I passed my Ph.D. thesis examination.
Jun 2025 I gave invited talks at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence and the HKUST ECE Future Leader Seminar.
Feb 2025 Our paper on neural correlation integrated adaptive point-process filtering was accepted by TNSRE.
Feb 2025 I completed a postdoctoral networking tour at Heidelberg University and the Technical University of Munich.
Oct 2024 I was awarded a DAAD AInet Fellowship.
Apr 2024 Two papers were accepted to EMBC 2024, and I received the NextGen Scholar Award.
Aug 2023 We organized the 4th International Workshop on Neural Engineering & Rehabilitation.
Aug 2023 Our paper on cognitive-analysis-based key concept derivation was accepted by ESWA.

Career

Research Scientist, Humanoid Lab, Anker Innovations · Apr 2025–Present

Robot UMI data collection, curation, and cloud data management
Pretraining and multimodal research for robotics manipulation
Investigation, testing, and evaluation of tactile sensors

Publications

Behaviorally reinforced spike generation reconnecting neural populations

NCS

A generative spike prediction model using behavioral reinforcement for re-establishing neural functional connectivity

Shenghui Wu, Zhiwei Song, Xiang Zhang, Yifan Huang, Shuhang Chen, Xiang Shen, Jieyuan Tan, Mingdong Li, et al.

Nature Computational Science, 2026
Paper

Population spike trains and neural connectivity entering an adaptive Bayesian filter

TNSRE

Neural Correlation Integrated Adaptive Point Process Filtering on Population Spike Trains

Mingdong Li, Shuhang Chen^†, Xiang Zhang, Yiwen Wang

IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering, 2025 · ^†co-first author
Paper

Elevator design protocols embedded and clustered into key concepts

ESWA

A Cognitive Analysis-based Key Concepts Derivation Approach for Product Design

Mingdong Li, Shanhe Lou, Hao Zheng, Yixiong Feng, Yicong Gao, Siyuan Zeng, Jianrong Tan

Expert Systems with Applications, 2024
Paper

Cerebellar-inspired constraint graph generating feasible product concepts

IJPR

A Cerebellar Operant Conditioning-inspired Constraint Satisfaction Approach for Product Design Concept Generation

Mingdong Li, Shanhe Lou, Yicong Gao, Hao Zheng, Bingtao Hu, Jianrong Tan

International Journal of Production Research, 2023
Paper

BERT and topic modeling pipeline for mining elevator customer requirements

Sci Rep

A Semantic Analysis Driven Customer Requirements Mining Method for Product Conceptual Design

Xuanyu Wu, Zhaoxi Hong, Yixiong Feng, Mingdong Li, Shanhe Lou, Jianrong Tan

Scientific Reports, 2022
Paper

Physical product and digital twin evaluated with psychophysiological signals

JCISE

A Digital Twin-Driven Method for Product Performance Evaluation Based on Intelligent Psycho-Physiological Analysis

Yixiong Feng, Mingdong Li, Shanhe Lou, Yicong Gao, Jianrong Tan

ASME Journal of Computing and Information Science in Engineering, 2021
Paper

Neural representations stabilizing across brain-machine interface task learning

NER

Estimating Neural Representations Underlying Behaviors via Point Process Filtering in Brain-machine Interface Task Learning

Mingdong Li, Tianyi Hu, Zhiwei Song, Mingyi Wang, Shenghui Wu, Jieyuan Tan, Zixu Wang, Yiwen Wang

IEEE EMBS 12th Annual International Conference on Neural Engineering (NER 2025; Spotlight, top 5%)

Dual adaptive point-process streams decoding circular movement and encoding engagement

EMBC

An Adaptive Superposition Point Process Model with Neuronal Encoding Engagement Identification

Mingdong Li, Mingyi Wang, Yiwen Wang

46th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC 2024; Oral)
Paper

Conditional neural networks evolving through successive learning stages

EMBC

Tracking Dynamic Conditional Neural Correlation during Task Learning

Zixu Wang, Shuhang Chen, Mingdong Li, Yiwen Wang

46th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC 2024; Oral)
Paper

Conjugate-gradient optimization tracking time-varying neural connectivity

EMBC

Tracking the Dynamic Functional Neural Connectivity via Conjugate Gradient Optimization

Mingdong Li, Shuhang Chen, Zhijia Zhao, Yiwen Wang

45th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC 2023; Oral)
Paper

Neural spike connectivity updating a Gaussian point-process Kalman filter

EMBC

Modeling Neural Connectivity in a Point-Process Analogue of Kalman Filter

Mingdong Li, Shuhang Chen, Xi Liu, Zhiwei Song, Yiwen Wang

44th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC 2022)
Paper

Activities

Academic Service & Teaching

Teaching Assistant: EMIA4110 Practical Machine Learning (Spring 2024); ELEC4130 Machine Learning on Images (Spring 2023).

Reviewer: JNE, TIV, ISBI, NER, and EMBC.

Selected Honors

DAAD AInet Fellow, 2024
IEEE EMBC NextGen Scholar Award, 2024
Zhejiang University Dissertation Year Scholarship, 2021
ZHEJIANG Lab International AI Competition, Excellence Prize, 2019

Colophon

Website style inspired by Cheng Chi's homepage. Edited by ChatGPT.