Ding Xilun (1967.8—) is a full professor and the dean of the School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation of Beihang University. He was a visiting professor at King's College London from 2006 to 2009. He received the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars from NSFC in 2011. In 2014, he was elected as a distinguished professor of the Chang Jiang Scholars Program.

His research focuses on mechanisms and robotics. He proposed the analysis theory of spatial elastic mechanisms and started the research on compliant metamorphic mechanisms. His inventions include a metamorphic mechanism designed to open and close hatches, a large flexible deployable mechanism for solar array, a six wheel-legged hybrid locomotion robot that can move in legged mode or wheeled mode and manipulate using legs as arms, a multi-propeller + dual-arm aero-robot, etc.

He has led over 30 projects, including more than 20 national projects involving NSFC key project, NSFC and Royal Society international cooperation project, China and Italy international cooperation project, China’s manned space engineering or lunar exploration. He has published over 170 papers, more than 120 of which are in journals indexed by the Science Citation Index/Ei Compendex. He wrote a monograph named Humanoid Dual-arm Robotics and co-authored four books. He has more than 40 patents in his name and many of them have been applied to major national space projects.