IROS Related Work

Use this to audit novelty and eligibility. Reopen the current CFP for dual-submission, anonymity, and prior-publication rules before advising authors. At IROS the question a reviewer asks is not only "is this new?" but "does the paper know the nearest systems it resembles and say what it does differently?"

Positioning checks

• Separate a systems contribution from a component tweak: a new integration, a new capability under a constraint, a new reliability level, or a deployment insight — not merely a swapped module.
• Cover the robotics-systems lanes, not just the one nearest your method; a manipulation paper still owes the perception and planning neighbors it builds on.
• Treat IEEE Xplore proceedings, RA-L, and T-RO as archival; position against them honestly rather than around them.
• Cite arXiv and prior workshop versions so double-anonymous review survives — never point a reviewer to an identity-revealing page or repository.
• Explain overlap with any prior or concurrent version of your own work, and do not submit duplicate archival material.

The lanes robotics reviewers check

A bibliography citing only your own subfield tells a reviewer the paper may be re-deriving a neighboring system's idea — a recognizable IROS weakness no amount of demo polish repairs.

Concurrent-work judgment calls

• Independently concurrent arXiv work: cite neutrally, state the technical difference, and avoid priority claims a reviewer cannot verify.
• Your own workshop version: usually non-archival and citable, but verify against the current CFP and phrase the citation so anonymity holds.
• When unsure whether a venue counts as archival for dual-submission, declare the overlap in the submission form rather than gambling on an editor's read.

Positioning vignette

Imagine the paper presents a lidar-inertial state estimator that runs on an embedded computer. Its nearest neighbors: a prior IROS lidar-odometry system it extends, an RA-L fusion method with a heavier compute footprint, and a CVPR learned-odometry component it borrows a front end from. The novelty sentence should name all three contrasts — tighter fusion than the IROS predecessor, a smaller compute budget than the RA-L method, and the learned front end credited and re-evaluated on real field data.

Novelty sentence template:
  "Unlike <nearest system> which <limitation>, our system <capability>
   under <embodiment constraint>, evidenced by <embodied result>."

Output format

[Eligibility] clear / needs declaration / risky
[Closest lanes] <conference/journal/perception/field>
[Nearest 3 systems] <system -> distinction>
[Archival-overlap risk] <none/issues>
[Novelty sentence] <IROS-ready systems contrast>