Dr.-Ing. Lars Ullrich
Chair of Automatic Control
Research associates
Address
Cauerstraße 7-9 91058 ErlangenRoom: 04.029, Floor: 04
Contact
Research Interests
- Probabilistic trajectory planning for autonomous operation in uncertain and dynamic environments
- Methodologies for system analysis and safety assurance of AI systems, agnostic to approaches , architectures, or application domains
- Trustworthy integration of AI into safety-critical and adaptive autonomous systems, enhancing performance while preserving reliability and robustness
- Design and analysis of system stacks to enable higher levels of autonomy
- Frameworks for the development and deployment of autonomous systems across diverse environments, technical setups, and operational constraints
Biography
| since 10/2025 | Post-doc, Chair of Automatic Control, FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen |
| since 01/2025 | Vice-Chair, IEEE ITSS German Chapter, Berlin |
| 05/2022-09/2025 | Research Assistant, Chair of Automatic Control, FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen |
| 02/2021-02/2022 | Student Research Assistant, Fraunhofer IIS, Nuremberg |
| 06/2020-03/2021 | Student Assistant, S-Outreach, FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen |
| 07/2016-09/2019 | Cooperative Student, WIKA Alexander Wiegand SE & Co. KG, Klingenberg am Main |
Education
| 10/2022-09/2025 | PhD (Dr.-Ing.), FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen |
| 10/2019-02/2022 | M.Sc. Mechatronics, FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen |
| 09/2020-07/2021 | Control, Robotics, and Autonomous Systems Program, Aalto-University, Helsinki |
| 07/2016-09/2019 | B.Eng. Mechatronics, Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University, Mosbach |
| 03/2019-06/2019 | International Program in Engineering, Baden-Wuerttemberg Cooperative State University, Mosbach |
| 07/2018 | Fulbright Intercultural Communication Program, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta |
Publications
2026
- Ullrich, L., Buchholz, M., Dietmayer, K., & Graichen, K. (2026). Toward Fully Autonomous Driving: AI, Challenges, Opportunities, and Needs. IEEE Access, 14, 17971-17997. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2026.3659192
2025
- Ullrich, L., Buchholz, M., Dietmayer, K., & Graichen, K. (2025). AI safety assurance for automated vehicles: A survey on research, standardization, regulation. IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Vehicles, 10(10), 4784-4803. https://doi.org/10.1109/TIV.2024.3496797
- Ullrich, L., Buchholz, M., Dietmayer, K., & Graichen, K. (2025). Expanding the Classical V-Model for the Development of Complex Systems Incorporating AI. IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Vehicles, 10(3), 1790-1804. https://doi.org/10.1109/TIV.2024.3434515
- Ullrich, L., Buchholz, M., Petit, J., Dietmayer, K., & Graichen, K. (2025). A Concept for Efficient Scalability of Automated Driving Allowing for Technical, Legal, Cultural, and Ethical Differences. In Proc. 2025 IEEE 28th International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSC) (pp. 2663-2670). Gold Coast (Australia).
- Ullrich, L., Mujirishvili, Z., & Graichen, K. (2025). Enhancing system self-awareness and trust of AI: A case study in trajectory prediction and planning. In Proceedings of the 36th IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IEEE IV 2025). Cluj-Napoca (Romania).
- Ullrich, L., Zimmer, W., Greer, R., Graichen, K., Knoll, A.C., & Trivedi, M. (2025). A New Perspective On AI Safety Through Control Theory Methodologies. IEEE Open Journal of Intelligent Transportation Systems, 6, 938-966. https://doi.org/10.1109/OJITS.2025.3585274
2024
- Rabenstein, G., Ullrich, L., & Graichen, K. (2024). Sampling for model predictive trajectory planning in autonomous driving using normalizing flows. In Proc. 35th IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IEEE IV 2024) (pp. 2091-2096). Jeju Island (Korea).
- Ullrich, L., McMaster, A., & Graichen, K. (2024). Transfer learning study of motion transformer based trajectory predictions. In Proc. 35th IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IEEE IV 2024) (pp. 110-117). Jeju Island (Korea).
2023
- Ullrich, L., Völz, A., & Graichen, K. (2023). Robust meta-learning of vehicle yaw rate dynamics via conditional neural processes. In Proc. 62nd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (CDC) (pp. 322-327). Marina Bay Sands (Singapore).
Open theses
If you are interested in working with me, please send your CV, transcript, and a brief explanation of why you want to join and what you hope to accomplish.
- Trajectory Planning in Autonomous Driving
Current and completed theses
- RoboRacer: Join the Future of Autonomous Racing
- A Comparative Analysis of Risk Metrics for Risk-Aware Motion Planning with a Model Predictive Path Integral Controller (MA)
- Scenario-Based Validation of Automated Driving Systems Using Large Language Models and Optimization Techniques (MA)
- Investigation of AI-empowered trajectory planning to increase trustworthiness (PP)
- Safety Assurance for Meta-Learning in Autonomous Driving (HiWi)
- Investigation of the transferability of data-driven prediction models of other traffic participants in the field of highly automated driving (MA)
- Implementation and integration of data-driven prediction models of other traffic participants into an existing software stack (HiWi)
- Implementation and evaluation of data-driven motion prediction models of dynamic road traffic objects for autonomous driving (FP)
- Investigation of neuromorphic computing for model predictive control with emphasis on trajectory optimization (HiWi)
- Investigating the capabilities of stochastic normalizing flows for trajectory planning in autonomous driving (MA)
- Modeling and evaluation of vehicle models using state of the art simulation software (HiWi)