Machine Learning and Optimization Lab

Machine Learning and Optimization Lab (MLO) at City University of Hong Kong primarily performs research in understanding and improving the reliability of modern machine learning systems. Our research interests include the following areas: If you are interested in fundamental machine learning theory and algorithms, please check the page of open positions for potential opportunities.

Members

Faculty and PI

PhD Students

Heqing Ren (2026.01 - )
  • Research Area: Machine Unlearning; Large Language Model.
  • Master's Degree, University of Zurich.
  • Master's Degree, Tsinghua University.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Zhejiang University.
Xiaofei Wang (2025.09 - )
  • Research Area: Efficient Learning; Large Language Model.
  • Master's Degree, Northwestern Polytechnical University.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Northwestern Polytechnical University.
Zhiyang Wu (2025.01 - , with Zhicong Lu from George Mason University)
  • Research Area: Human Computer Interaction; AI Ethics.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
Jingning Xu (2024.09 - )
  • Research Area: Adversarial Robustness; Multimodal Model.
  • Master's Degree, Tongji University.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Tongji University.
Xu Yang (2023.09 - , with Ying Wei from Zhejiang University)
  • Research Area: Large Language Model; Domain Generalization.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Sichuan University.
Xinping Chen (2023.09 - )
  • Research Area: Privacy; Data Reconstruction.
  • Master's Degree, Imperial College London.
  • Bachelor's Degree, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China.
Ding Chen (2023.06 - )
  • Research Area: Differential Privacy; Optimization Theory.
  • Master's Degree, Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Huazhong University of Science and Technology.
Xuyang Zhong (2023.01 - )
  • Research Area: Adversarial Training; Machine Unlearning.
  • Master's Degree, Technical University of Munich.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Beijing Institute of Technology.
  • Personal Website

MPhil Students

Baoyi Zhong (2026.01 - )
  • Research Area: Efficient Learning; Large Language Model.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Dalian University of Technology.
Jiandong Chen (2025.09 - )
  • Research Area: Large Language Model; AI4Finance.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Beijing Normal University.
Haochen Luo (2025.01 - )
  • Research Area: Large Language Model; AI4Finance.
  • Bachelor's Degree, Northeastern University.

Alumni

Including project advisees who worked with the PI for more than 6 months.
Yixiao Huang (2024.03 - 2024.07) → PhD at UC Berkeley
Shuangqi Li (2022.03 - 2023.05) → PhD at EPFL
Yulun Jiang (2021.09 - 2023.01) → PhD at EPFL
Ziqi Zhao (2021.03 - 2022.01) → PhD at HKU