John J. Leonard

Who is John J. Leonard?

John J. Leonard is an American roboticist and Professor of Mechanical and Ocean Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A member of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Leonard is a renowned researcher in simultaneous localization and mapping, and was the team lead for MIT's 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge Team, one of the six teams to cross the finish line in the final event, placing fourth overall.

Leonard received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in 1987 and his Ph.D. in Engineering Science from the University of Oxford in 1994, under the Thouron Award. He spent five years as a postdoctoral fellow and Research Scientist in the MIT Sea Grant Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Laboratory, and joined the MIT faculty in 1996.

Leonard has served as an associate editor of the IEEE Journal of Oceanic Engineering and of the IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation. He received the National Science Foundation Career Award in 1998, an E.T.S. Walton Visitor Award from Science Foundation Ireland in 2004, and the King-Sun Fu Memorial Best IEEE Transactions on Robotics Paper Award in 2006.