Ruiyang Xu

PhD Student

  • MSCS, Northeastern University
  • BS, Nanjing Forestry University - China

Ruiyang Xu is a PhD student in the Computer Science program at Northeastern University's Khoury College of Computer Sciences, advised by Professor Karl Lieberherr. Ruiyang’s research is focused on program design and artificial intelligence. He is interested in creating programming tools using a combination of artificial intelligence techniques. Prior to joining the PhD program, Ruiyang earned his master’s degree from Northeastern University and his bachelor’s degree from Nanjing Forestry University in China.

What are the specifics of your graduate education (thus far)?

I am a computer science student. During my undergraduate education, I took some basic courses in computer science as well as some math courses in computational fields. After completing my undergraduate degree at Northeastern University, I continued my studies in computer science as a master’s student. During the master’s program, I became interested in artificial intelligence and program design and decided to continue my research as a PhD student.

What are your research interests?

I’m interested in applying cutting-edge AI techniques (especially reinforcement learning) to practical problems and tasks. Specifically, I’m working on solving certain model checking problems through reinforcement learning (RL), a fast-growing field in recent years. I hope this research can eventually make the model checker handle a complex and large state space. Previously, I was working on solving an algorithmic problem through Monte Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) based RL (an approach that led to the success of AlphaZero). The research motivated me to combine logic expression with gameplay, which later inspired me to apply a similar technique to model checking.

What aspect of what you do is most interesting?

Researching is always full of creativity and innovation, and I especially enjoy reading papers by other researchers. I always feel inspired by their ideas.

What are your research or career goals, going forward?

Firstly, I need to publish papers on some well-known conferences and in journals, and then I'll decide whether to continue in academia or to apply my research to the industry.