Members
Vasilis Gkatzelis
Vasilis Gkatzelis is an associate professor in computer science at Drexel University. He previously held positions as a postdoctoral scholar at the computer science departments of UC Berkeley and Stanford University, and as a research fellow at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing. He received his PhD from the Courant Institute of New York University and his research focuses on problems in algorithmic game theory and approximation algorithms.
Manolis Pountourakis
Manolis Pountourakis is an assistant professor in computer science at Drexel University. He previously held positions as a postdoctoral fellow at the electrical and computer engineering department at the University of Texas at Austin and as a research fellow at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing. He received his PhD from Northwestern University in 2017 and was a long-term visitor at Microsoft Research New England from 2014 to 2016. His research focuses on algorithmic game theory, algorithmic mechanism design, and approximation algorithms.
Shahin Jabbari
Shahin Jabbari is an assistant professor in the Computer Science Department of the College of Computing & Informatics at Drexel University. Before Drexel, Shahin was a CRCS postdoctoral fellow in the Computer Science Department of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard and a PhD student in the Computer and Information Science Department at University of Pennsylvania. Shahin's research interests include algorithmic fairness, machine learning and game theory.
Xizhi Tan
Xizhi Tan, currently a PhD candidate at Drexel University under the guidance of Vasilis Gkatzelis, holds a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics from the same institution. Her research is centered around the integration of mechanism design and machine learning. Her thesis focuses on "learning-augmented mechanisms," exploring how predictions can be used to enhance mechanisms in strategic settings while maintaining worst-case guarantees.
Marius Garbea
Marius Garbea is a PhD student at Drexel. He previously graduated from Drexel in 2021, with a double major in Computer Science and Mathematics. He is from Romania and came to Drexel after focusing on computer science in general and data structures and algorithms in particular during high school. He is interested in algorithms that span the blockchain space, such as decentralization, cryptography, consensus in networks, and game theory.
Rishi Patel
Rishi Patel is a PhD student at Drexel. He previously graduated from Drexel in 2021, with a double major in Computer Science and Mathematics. His interests include the applications of mathematics to computer science. He has previously researched type systems and he spent two terms as a research co-op conducting research in the design and analysis of ascending auctions. He has also previously worked as a software engineer for Lockheed Martin. He has been a member of the reading group since the fall of 2018.
Kruthika Ravi
Kruthika Ravi is a PhD student in CS at Drexel. She previously graduated with a Master's in Mechanical Engineering from University of Texas at Arlington and worked in the industry as a Machine Learning Engineer for over 3 years. Her interests include areas of multi agent systems and machine learning. She has been a member of the reading group since the fall of 2022.
Kshitij Kayastha
Kshitij Kayastha is a PhD student at Drexel. He is from Nepal, and he previously graduated from Drexel in 2022, with a major in Mathematics and a minor in Computer Science. During his undergraduate, Kshitij worked as a Software Engineer and Data Scientist at SAP for 3 years. His research interests include algorithmic fairness and machine learning.
Alvand Vahedi
Alvand Vahedi is a PhD student at Drexel University, supervised by Dr. Jabbari. He earned his B.S. in Computer Engineering from Amirkabir University. Alvand's academic interests revolve around algorithmic fairness, machine learning, and game theory. He worked as a software engineer for four years.
Josh Ascher
Josh Ascher is a PhD student at Drexel, advised by Vasilis Gkatzelis. He has a Bachelor's degree in mathematics from the University of Pittsburgh, where he also researched online algorithms. He is broadly interested in algorithms and mechanisms, as well studying these using beyond-worst case analysis He has been a member of the reading group since the fall of 2024.
Emma Rewinski
Emma Rewinski is a PhD student at Drexel University advised by Vasilis Gkatzelis. Her research currently focuses on social choice and metric distortion. She has been a member of the reading group since the winter of 2021.
Alumni
Dan Schoepflin
Dan Schoepflin graduated with a PhD from Drexel University in the summer of 2023 (advised by Vasilis Gkatzelis). He subsequently joined Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute at Berkeley as a postdoctoral scholar. His main research interests are algorithmic mechanism design and approximation algorithms with a particular focus on designing and analyzing practical mechanisms. In Summer 2022, he was a research intern at Google under the supervision of Gagan Goel.
Nick DeFilippis
Nick DeFilippis graduated from Drexel in 2022 with a double major in Mathematics and Computer Science and a minor in Astrophysics. He then joined the mathematics PhD program of the Courant Institute of NYU. His interests are in using mathematics and computer science to develop solutions to real-world problems.
Pranav Garimidi
Pranav Garimidi is a junior at Columbia University, pursuing a degree in Computer Science. He joined the reading group as a junior in high school, conducting research on the fair allocation of indivisible goods under the supervision of Vasilis Gkatzelis, which led to a AAAI publication while he was still in high school. He subsequently published more work on fair division and auctions.
Safa Aman
Safa Aman graduated from Drexel University in 2020, with a B.S and M.S in Computer Science, and with a minor in Economics. She subsequently joined Google. Her interests include human-computer interaction, artificial intelligence, and algorithms. Safa has previously worked with Dr. Erin Solovey’s Advanced Interaction Research Group as a STAR Scholar. At Drexel, she is an active Student Ambassador and has been the President of the Women in Computing Society for 2 years. She has been a member of the reading group since the winter of 2019.
Bailey Flanigan
Bailey Flanigan was a visiting researcher at Drexel University during the 2018-19 academic year. She then joined computer science PhD program at Carnegie Mellon University. She is interested in questions at the intersection of computational game theory and networks. Prior to Drexel, she was a pre-doctoral fellow at the Yale Department of Economics. She received her B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin.
Curtis Bechtel
Curtis Bechtel graduated from Drexel University in 2019 with a B.S. in Mathematics and a B.S. in Computer Science. After graduation, he entered a PhD program at the University of Southern California. He is interested broadly in theoretical computer science with a focus on algorithms, graph theory, and algorithmic game theory. He previously worked as a software developer for the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, New Jersey, where he helped develop a large-scale parallel data analysis system.