Christopher R. Laughman
- Phone: 617-621-7545
- Email:
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Position:
Research / Technical Staff
Senior Principal Research Scientist,
Senior Team Leader -
Education:
Ph.D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2008 -
Research Areas:
External Links:
Chris' Quick Links
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Biography
Christopher's interests lie in the intersection of the modeling of physical systems and the experimental construction and testing of these systems, including simulation, numerical methods, and fault detection. He has worked on a variety of multi-physical systems, such as thermo-fluid systems and electromechanical energy conversion systems.
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Recent News & Events
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NEWS MERL Presents 4 Main Conference Papers and 6 Workshop Papers at ICML 2026 Date: July 6, 2026 - July 11, 2026
Where: COEX, Seoul, South Korea
MERL Contacts: Moitreya Chatterjee; Anoop Cherian; Stefano Di Cairano; Toshiaki Koike-Akino; Christopher R. Laughman; Jing Liu; Suhas Lohit; Kuan-Chuan Peng; Alexander Schperberg; Ye Wang; Gordon Wichern
Research Areas: Artificial Intelligence, Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Signal ProcessingBrief- MERL researchers are proud to present 4 main conference papers and 6 workshop papers at ICML 2026. ICML, taking place from July 6-11 in Seoul, South Korea, is a premier international conference in machine learning.
Main Conference Papers with MERL Authors:
1. Understanding Dynamic Compute Allocation in Recurrent Transformers by Ibraheem Muhammad Moosa, Suhas Lohit, Ye Wang, Moitreya Chatterjee, and Wenpeng Yin.
2. LLawCo: Learning Laws of Cooperation for Modeling Embodied Multi-Agent Behavior by Qinhong Zhou, Chuang Gan, and Anoop Cherian.
3. Memory-Distilled Selection for Noise-Robust Anomaly Detection by Sirojbek Safarov, Jaewoo Park, Yoon G. Jung, Kuan-Chuan Peng, Wonchul Kim, Seongdeok Bang, and Octavia Camps.
4. Partial Ring Scan: Revisiting Scan Order in Vision State Space Models by Yi-Kuan Hsieh, Kuan-Chuan Peng, Xin Li, Ming-Ching Chang, Yu-Chee Tseng, and Jun-Wei Hsieh.
Workshop Papers with MERL Authors:
1. WISE: Weighted Iterative Society-of-Experts for Multimodal Multi-Agent Debate with Probabilistic Consensus by Anoop Cherian, Suhas Lohit, and Kuan-Chuan Peng. (Workshop on Scalable Learning and Optimization for Efficient Multimodal AI Agents (SCALE))
2. MIRROR: Multisensory Implicit Rejection-sampled RObotic policy by Amisha Bhaskar, Pratap Tokekar, Stefano Di Cairano, and Alexander Schperberg. (Workshop on Structured Probabilistic Inference & Generative Modeling)
3. Reinforced Neural Processes: Memory-Efficient Time-Series Forecasting with a World-Feedback-Trained Memory Policy by Nibraas Khan, Gordon Wichern, and Christopher R. Laughman. (Workshop on Reinforcement Learning from World Feedback (RLxF))
4. Connecting Low-Rank Adapters and Policy Stability in GRPO Fine-Tuning by Antonin Rottman, Francesco Tonin, Yongtao Wu, Toshiaki Koike-Akino, and Volkan Cevher. (Workshop on Connecting Low-rank Representations in AI (CoLorAI))
5. EinSort: Sorting is All We Need for Tensorizing LLM by Toshiaki Koike-Akino, Jing Liu, and Ye Wang. (Workshop on Connecting Low-rank Representations in AI (CoLorAI))
6. Temper and Tilt Lead to SLOP: Reward Hacking Mitigation with Inference-Time Alignment by Ye Wang, and Jing Liu, and Toshiaki Koike-Akino. (Workshop on Agents in the Wild: Safety, Security, and Beyond)
- MERL researchers are proud to present 4 main conference papers and 6 workshop papers at ICML 2026. ICML, taking place from July 6-11 in Seoul, South Korea, is a premier international conference in machine learning.
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NEWS MERL researchers present 8 papers at ACC 2026 Date: May 26, 2026 - May 29, 2026
Where: New Orleans, USA
MERL Contacts: Scott A. Bortoff; Vedang M. Deshpande; Stefano Di Cairano; Christopher R. Laughman; Jordan Leung; Hongtao Qiao; Zhaolin Ren; Abraham P. Vinod; Yebin Wang
Research Areas: Control, Dynamical Systems, Optimization, RoboticsBrief- MERL researchers presented 8 papers at the recently concluded American Control Conference (ACC) 2026 in New Orleans, USA. The papers covered a wide range of topics including robust controllable set computation, vapor compression cycle calibration, task-reasoning LLM agents, Minkowski-cost stable MPC, polynomial chaos approximation, invariant-set motion planning, heat-pump MPC architectures, and relaxed barrier-function MPC. Additionally, Zhaolin Ren was an invited speaker at Multi-Agent Dynamic Games workshop, and Abraham Vinod served as a panelist at the Professional Development and Career Advice for Young Professionals session.
As a sponsor of the conference, MERL maintained a booth for open discussions with researchers and students, and hosted a special session to discuss highlights of MERL research and work philosophy.
- MERL researchers presented 8 papers at the recently concluded American Control Conference (ACC) 2026 in New Orleans, USA. The papers covered a wide range of topics including robust controllable set computation, vapor compression cycle calibration, task-reasoning LLM agents, Minkowski-cost stable MPC, polynomial chaos approximation, invariant-set motion planning, heat-pump MPC architectures, and relaxed barrier-function MPC. Additionally, Zhaolin Ren was an invited speaker at Multi-Agent Dynamic Games workshop, and Abraham Vinod served as a panelist at the Professional Development and Career Advice for Young Professionals session.
See All News & Events for Chris -
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Internships with Chris
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MS0098: Internship - Control and Estimation for Large-Scale Thermofluid Systems
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MS0260: Internship - Experimental Thermofluid Systems
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MERL Publications
- , "Reinforced Neural Processes: Memory-Efficient Time-Series Forecasting with a World-Feedback-Trained Memory Policy", ICML Workshop on Reinforcement Learning from World Feedback (RLxF), July 2026.BibTeX TR2026-095 PDF
- @inproceedings{Khan2026jul,
- author = {Khan, Nibraas and Wichern, Gordon and Laughman, Christopher R.},
- title = {{Reinforced Neural Processes: Memory-Efficient Time-Series Forecasting with a World-Feedback-Trained Memory Policy}},
- booktitle = {ICML Workshop on Reinforcement Learning from World Feedback (RLxF)},
- year = 2026,
- month = jul,
- url = {https://www.merl.com/publications/TR2026-095}
- }
- , "Sequential Model Calibration of Vapor Compression Cycles using Approximate Bayesian Computation", American Control Conference (ACC), May 2026.BibTeX TR2026-061 PDF
- @inproceedings{Zinage2026may,
- author = {Zinage, Shrenik and Dixit, Vaibhav and Chakrabarty, Ankush and Qiao, Hongtao and Laughman, Christopher R. and Bilionis, Ilias and Deshpande, Vedang M.},
- title = {{Sequential Model Calibration of Vapor Compression Cycles using Approximate Bayesian Computation}},
- booktitle = {American Control Conference (ACC)},
- year = 2026,
- month = may,
- url = {https://www.merl.com/publications/TR2026-061}
- }
- , "Modular Deep Learning Framework for Vapor-Compression HVAC Systems: Scalable, Efficient, and Physically Consistent Modeling", Applied Thermal Engineering, May 2026.BibTeX TR2026-058 PDF
- @article{Vaziri2026may,
- author = {Vaziri, Ali and Qiao, Hongtao and Laughman, Christopher R. and Fang, Huazhen},
- title = {{Modular Deep Learning Framework for Vapor-Compression HVAC Systems: Scalable, Efficient, and Physically Consistent Modeling}},
- journal = {Applied Thermal Engineering},
- year = 2026,
- month = may,
- url = {https://www.merl.com/publications/TR2026-058}
- }
- , "Scalable Physics-Informed Neural Differential Equations and Data-Driven Algorithms for HVAC Systems", arXiv, April 2026.BibTeX arXiv
- @article{Zhai2026apr,
- author = {Zhai, Hanfeng and Qiao, Hongtao and Mansour, Hassan and Laughman, Christopher R.},
- title = {{Scalable Physics-Informed Neural Differential Equations and Data-Driven Algorithms for HVAC Systems}},
- journal = {arXiv},
- year = 2026,
- month = apr,
- url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.18438}
- }
- , "Quantile-SMPC for Grid-Interactive Buildings with Multivariate Temporal Fusion Transformers", Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS) Workshop on UrbanAI, December 2025.BibTeX TR2026-001 PDF
- @inproceedings{Hutchinson2025dec,
- author = {{{Hutchinson, Spencer and Vinod, Abraham P. and Germain, François G and Di Cairano, Stefano and Laughman, Christopher R. and Chakrabarty, Ankush}}},
- title = {{{Quantile-SMPC for Grid-Interactive Buildings with Multivariate Temporal Fusion Transformers}}},
- booktitle = {Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS) Workshop on UrbanAI},
- year = 2025,
- month = dec,
- url = {https://www.merl.com/publications/TR2026-001}
- }
- , "Reinforced Neural Processes: Memory-Efficient Time-Series Forecasting with a World-Feedback-Trained Memory Policy", ICML Workshop on Reinforcement Learning from World Feedback (RLxF), July 2026.
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Software & Data Downloads
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Videos
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MERL Issued Patents
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Title: "System and Method for Data-Driven Control of an Air-Conditioning System"
Inventors: Qiao, Hongtao; Chakrabarty, Ankush; Laughman, Christopher; Wang, Yebin
Patent No.: 12,632,016
Issue Date: May 19, 2026 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling a Vapor Compression System with Safe Actuator Changes"
Inventors: Chakrabarty, Ankush; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 12,516,840
Issue Date: Jan 6, 2026 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling an Operation of a Vapor Compression Cycle"
Inventors: Deshpande, Vedang; Chinchilla, Raphael; Chakrabarty, Ankush; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 12,510,278
Issue Date: Dec 30, 2025 -
Title: "System and Method for Monitoring an Operation of a Vapor Compression Cycle"
Inventors: Laughman, Christopher; Deshpande, Vedang
Patent No.: 12,366,395
Issue Date: Jul 22, 2025 -
Title: "System and Method for Calculation of Thermofluid Properties using Saturation Curve-Aligned Coordinates"
Inventors: Laughman, Christopher; Bortoff, Scott A.; Qiao, Hongtao
Patent No.: 11,739,996
Issue Date: Aug 29, 2023 -
Title: "Method and System for Circuiting in Heat Exchangers"
Inventors: Raghunathan, Arvind U; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 11,704,447
Issue Date: Jul 18, 2023 -
Title: "Controlling Vapor Compression System Using Probabilistic Surrogate Model"
Inventors: Chakrabarty, Ankush; Laughman, Christopher; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 11,573,023
Issue Date: Feb 7, 2023 -
Title: "Extremum Seeking Control with Stochastic Gradient Estimation"
Inventors: Chakrabarty, Ankush; Danielson, Claus; Bortoff, Scott A.; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 11,467,544
Issue Date: Oct 11, 2022 -
Title: "System and Method for Power Optimizing Control of Multi-Zone Heat Pumps"
Inventors: Bortoff, Scott A.; Burns, Daniel J; Laughman, Christopher; Qiao, Hongtao
Patent No.: 10,895,412
Issue Date: Jan 19, 2021 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Refrigerant in Vapor Compression System"
Inventors: Laughman, Christopher; Qiao, Hongtao; Burns, Daniel J; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 10,830,515
Issue Date: Nov 10, 2020 -
Title: "System and Method for Thermal Comfort Control"
Inventors: Bortoff, Scott A.; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 10,767,887
Issue Date: Sep 8, 2020 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Vapor Compression Systems"
Inventors: Burns, Daniel J; Laughman, Christopher; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 10,495,364
Issue Date: Dec 3, 2019 -
Title: "Coordinated Operation of Multiple Space-Conditioning Systems"
Inventors: Laughman, Christopher; Qiao, Hongtao; Burns, Daniel J; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 10,234,158
Issue Date: Mar 19, 2019 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Multi-Zone Vapor Compression Systems"
Inventors: Burns, Daniel J; Di Cairano, Stefano; Bortoff, Scott A.; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 10,174,957
Issue Date: Jan 8, 2019 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling of Vapor Compression System"
Inventors: Burns, Dan; Jain, Neera; Laughman, Christopher; Di Cairano, Stefano; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 9,625,196
Issue Date: Apr 18, 2017 -
Title: "Method For Reconstructing 3D Scenes From 2D Images"
Inventors: Ramalingam, Srikumar; Taguchi, Yuichi; Pillai, Jaishanker K; Burns, Dan; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 9,595,134
Issue Date: Mar 14, 2017 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Vapor Compression Systems"
Inventors: Burns, Dan; Laughman, Christopher; Bortoff, Scott A.
Patent No.: 9,534,820
Issue Date: Jan 3, 2017 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Temperature and Humidity in Multiple Spaces using Liquid Desiccant"
Inventors: Laughman, Christopher; Burns, Daniel J; Bortoff, Scott A.; Waters, Richard C.
Patent No.: 9,518,765
Issue Date: Dec 13, 2016 -
Title: "Adaptive Control of Vapor Compression System"
Inventors: Burns, Dan J.; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 9,182,154
Issue Date: Nov 10, 2015 -
Title: "Controlling Operation of Vapor Compression System"
Inventors: Nikovski, Daniel N.; Laughman, Christopher; Burns, Dan J.
Patent No.: 8,793,003
Issue Date: Jul 29, 2014 -
Title: "System and Method for Controlling Operations of Vapor Compression"
Inventors: Bortoff, Scott A.; Burns, Dan J.; Laughman, Christopher
Patent No.: 8,694,131
Issue Date: Apr 8, 2014
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Title: "System and Method for Data-Driven Control of an Air-Conditioning System"
