Chow Yin Lai obtained his Diplom Ingenieur (FH) degree in Mechatronics from the University of Heilbronn in Germany in 2006, and his PhD in Control and Automation from the National University of Singapore in 2011. He also completed part of his PhD research at the University of California at Berkeley as a visiting research scholar in 2010.
Between 2011 and 2014, Chow Yin was a Research Scientist at the A*STAR Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology, where he developed new force control technologies for industrial robots, and collaborated with industrial partners such as Rolls Royce and Boeing in the use of robotic force control technologies for the aerospace industry. In 2015, he joined RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia as a Lecturer in Automation, where he taught mechatronics and robotics subjects, while doing research in the areas of surgical robots and service robots.
From November 2019 to April 2025, Chow Yin took up a teaching-focused role at UCL (University College London), where he developed and taught robotics and machine learning modules. He was also the Departmental Undergraduate Tutor, providing pastoral support to all undergraduate students within the Department. In April 2025, Chow Yin went back to his home country for a brief period, and has returned to the UK in October 2025, joining Loughborough University as a Teaching Fellow in the subject areas of robotics and control.
Dr Chow Yin Lai's main research and interests are:
- Design and control of medical robots, service robots, industrial robots.
- Robot programming by demonstration.