Faculty

Xiaoqi Tan	Assistant Professor Department of Computing Science University of Alberta Fellow of Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii) Homepage | Biography | Google Scholar

Graduate Students/RAs

Haoxin Sang	PhD student (01/2025-present) Haoxin joined the SODALab in Jan 2025. He received his MSc in Fundamental Mathematics from University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (2024) and B.S. in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics from Harbin Institute of Technology (2021).
Faraz Zargari	PhD student (01/2025-present) Faraz joined the SODALab as a PhD student in Jan 2025. Before starting his PhD, Faraz worked as a RA in the SODALab during 2024-2025. He received his MSc in Electrical and Computer Engineering from University of Alberta (2023) and B.Sc. in Civil Engineering from Sharif University of Technology (2021). Co-advised with Yunwei (Ryan) Li University of Alberta Graduate Recruitment Scholarship (2025)
Kushagra Chandak	PhD student (09/2023-present) Kushagra joined the SODALab in Sept 2023. He received his MSc in Computing Science from University of Alberta (2023) and BTech in Computer Science from IIIT Hyderabad (2019). Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship (2023)
Shuai Liu	PhD student (09/2023-present) Shuai joined the SODALab in Sept 2023. He received his MSc in Computing Science from University of Alberta (2023) and B.Sc. in Computer Science from Harbin Institute of Technology (2021). Co-advised with Csaba Szepesvári Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship (2024)
Vlad Tkachuk	PhD student (09/2023-present) Vlad joined the SODALab in Sept 2023. He received his MSc in Computing Science from University of Alberta (2023) and B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from University of Waterloo (2021). Co-advised with Csaba Szepesvári Canada Graduate Scholarships – Doctoral (CGS D) Award (2025) Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship (2024)
Lyndon Hallett	MSc student (09/2025-present) Lyndon joined the SODALab in Sept 2025. He received his B.Sc. in Computing Science from University of Alberta (2025).
Siyuan Yu	MSc student (09/2023-present) Siyuan joined the SODALab in Sept 2023. He received his B.Sc. in Computing Science from University of Alberta (2023). Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship (2024-2025)
Hossein Nekouyan	RA (05/2025-present) Hossein received his M.Sc. in Computing Science with the SODALab in April 2025. Before that, He received his B.Sc. in Computer Science from University of Tehran (2022).

Alumni (Former Graduate Students)

• SeyedehKimia Alaviyar (MSc, 03/2023—04/2025)
  Thesis: Multi-phase Regularized Online Allocation
  Last known position: Machine Learning Resident @Amii
• Hasti Nourmohammadi (MSc, 03/2023—04/2025)
  Thesis: Value-oblivious Secretaries with Advice
  Last known position: Research Associate @Amii
• Shayan Karimi (MSc, 03/2023—04/2025)
  Thesis: Computational Complexity of Reinforcement Learning under Partial qπ-realizability
• Hossein Nekouyan (MSc, 01/2023—04/2025)
  Thesis: Randomized Posted Pricing and Rounding Schemes for Online Selection and Matching
  Last known position: Research Assistant @UofA
• Yanzhao Wang (MSc, 09/2022—01/2025)
  Thesis: Online Conversion under Horizon Uncertainty: From Competitive Analysis to Learning-Augmented Algorithms

Undergraduate Students (Current/Past)¹

• Lyndon Hallett, NSERC USRA (Summer 2024) → Undergraduate Research Assistant (Summer 2025) → Last known position: MSc student @UofA (2025)
• John Tyler, NSERC USRA (Summer 2023) → Undergraduate Research Intern (Summer 2024)
• Yanze Song, Undergraduate Research Intern (Summer 2023) → Last known position: MSc student @UofA (2025)
• Zixuan Xie, Undergraduate Research Intern (Summer 2023) → Last known position: PhD student at University of Virginia (2024)
• Johnson Wu, Undergraduate Research Assistant (Summer 2022) → Software Engineer Intern at Intel (2023) → Last known position: Compiler Engineer @Amazon Web Services (AWS)
• Siyuan Yu, Undergraduate Research Assistant (Summer 2022) → URI Undergraduate Researcher (Summer 2023) → Last known position: MSc student @UofA (2023)

Visiting Students (Current/Past)

• Ying Cao, PhD student from HKUST (08/2023–01/2024)