mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Learning Perception-Aware Agile Flight in Cluttered Environments

arXiv 2210.01841 ↗First posted 4 Oct 2022cs.RO cs.AIcited by 13

On the map: Offline RL and imitation learning from data → Imitation learning methods

Abstract (arXiv)

Recently, neural control policies have outperformed existing model-based planning-and-control methods for autonomously navigating quadrotors through cluttered environments in minimum time. However, they are not perception aware, a crucial requirement in vision-based navigation due to the camera's limited field of view and the underactuated nature of a quadrotor. We propose a learning-based system that achieves perception-aware, agile flight in cluttered environments. Our method combines imitation learning with reinforcement learning (RL) by leveraging a privileged learning-by-cheating framework. Using RL, we first train a perception-aware teacher policy with full-state information to fly in minimum time through cluttered environments. Then, we use imitation learning to distill its knowledge into a vision-based student policy that only perceives the environment via a camera. Our approach tightly couples perception and control, showing a significant advantage in computation speed (10 times faster) and success rate. We demonstrate the closed-loop control performance using hardware-in-the-loop simulation.

Key facts. Cited by 13 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in Imitation learning methods, one of 13 directions in Offline RL and imitation learning from data. Builds on 20 of its 36 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 4 Oct 2022.

Builds on

20 of 36 references.

References · 20

  1. 2017Attention Is All You Needcited by 59,932
  2. 2017Proximal Policy Optimization Algorithmscited by 14,441
  3. 2019Learning by Cheatingcited by 361
  4. 2016CAD2RL: Real Single-Image Flight without a Single Real Imagecited by 227
  5. 2021Vision-Only Robot Navigation in a Neural Radiance Worldcited by 153
  6. 2021Learning High-Speed Flight in the Wildcited by 98
  7. 2020Flightmare: A Flexible Quadrotor Simulatorcited by 69
  8. 2021Autonomous Drone Racing with Deep Reinforcement Learningcited by 51
  9. 2015Learning Deep Control Policies for Autonomous Aerial Vehicles with MPC-Guided Policy Searchcited by 41
  10. 2019Robust and Efficient Quadrotor Trajectory Generation for Fast Autonomous Flightcited by 32
  11. 2017Differential Flatness of Quadrotor Dynamics Subject to Rotor Drag for Accurate Tracking of High-Speed Trajectoriescited by 28
  12. 2018PAMPC: Perception-Aware Model Predictive Control for Quadrotorscited by 22
8 more
  1. 2018Memory-based Deep Reinforcement Learning for Obstacle Avoidance in UAV with Limited Environment Knowledgecited by 21
  2. 2021A Comparative Study of Nonlinear MPC and Differential-Flatness-Based Control for Quadrotor Agile Flightcited by 19
  3. 2021Policy Search for Model Predictive Control with Application to Agile Drone Flightcited by 17
  4. 2021Time-Optimal Planning for Quadrotor Waypoint Flightcited by 14
  5. 2017Search-based Motion Planning for Aggressive Flight in SE(3)cited by 11
  6. 2022Learning Minimum-Time Flight in Cluttered Environmentscited by 8
  7. 2016Aggressive Quadrotor Flight through Narrow Gaps with Onboard Sensing and Computing using Active Visioncited by 3
  8. 2022Minimum-Time Quadrotor Waypoint Flight in Cluttered Environmentscited by 3

Built on by

Cited by year (2026 to 7 Oct)

Citing papers per year: 2023: 2; 2024: 2; 2025: 4; 2026: 5.

13 papers.

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  1. 2023Extreme Parkour with Legged Robotscited by 120
  2. 2024Vision Transformers for End-to-End Vision-Based Quadrotor Obstacle Avoidancecited by 10
  3. 2025RAPID: Robust and Agile Planner Using Inverse Reinforcement Learning for Vision-Based Drone Navigationcited by 5
  4. 2025To Distill or Decide? Understanding the Algorithmic Trade-off in Partially Observable Reinforcement Learningcited by 3
  5. 2023Learning to Initialize Trajectory Optimization for Vision-Based Autonomous Flight in Unknown Environmentscited by 0
  6. 2024PRIMER: Perception-Aware Robust Learning-based Multiagent Trajectory Plannercited by 0
  7. 2025VizFlyt: Perception-centric Pedagogical Framework For Autonomous Aerial Robotscited by 0
  8. 2025Unified Linear Parametric Map Modeling and Perception-aware Trajectory Planning for Mobile Roboticscited by 0
  9. 2026Zero-Shot UAV Navigation in Forests via Relightable 3D Gaussian Splattingcited by 0
  10. 2026Vision-Guided Outdoor Flight and Obstacle Evasion via Reinforcement Learningcited by 0
  11. 2026Teacher-Student Representational Alignment for Reinforcement Learning-Driven Imitation Learningcited by 0
  12. 2026AeroVerse-SatAgent: UAV-Satellite Collaborative Spatial Reasoning Inspired by the Dual Visual Pathway Theory of Cognitive Neurosciencecited by 0
1 more
  1. 2026PILOT: Privileged Imitation Learning for End-to-End Motion Planning of Autonomous UAVs under Partial Observabilitycited by 0

Similar, not cited

Close in wording, no citation either way

  1. 2024Bootstrapping Reinforcement Learning with Imitation for Vision-Based Agile Flight
  2. 2025Dream to Fly: Model-Based Reinforcement Learning for Vision-Based Drone Flight
  3. 2026Learning to Fly: Stable Vision-Guided UAV Servoing with Compact Target-Centric Cues and Reinforcement Learning
  4. 2026VLN on the Fly: An Onboard Vision-Language Navigation Stack for Aerial Robots
  5. 2025RAPTOR: A Foundation Policy for Quadrotor Control
  6. 2024Synergistic Reinforcement and Imitation Learning for Vision-driven Autonomous Flight of UAV Along River
  7. 2026MAD: Mapping-Aware World Models for Agile Quadrotor Flight
  8. 2026Generalization of World Models under Environmental Variability for Vision-based Quadrotor Navigation