I am an Associate Professor in the School of Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Southampton, UK from Feb. 2024. I am also an Adjunct Assistant Professor (Honorary Position) in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Northwestern University, US. My research interests include the formal verification and design of machine learning algorithms (in particular reinforcement learning) with respect to important properties, e.g. safety, security, robustness, etc., under uncertain environments. I am also interested in providing reliable machine-learning solutions to various applications in robotics, transportation, etc.

Prior to Southamton, I was a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Liverpool, UK. Before joining Liverpool, I worked with Prof. Qi Zhu as a postdoc fellow, in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Northwestern University. Prior to Northwestern, I received my B.S. and Ph.D. in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics and Computer Science from Nanjing University, China respectively. I also visited the Department of Computer Science at Aalborg University and was pleased to work with Prof. Kim G. Larsen.

Recent News

• Sep. 2024 Our paper “Variational Delayed Policy Optimization” has been accepted to NeurIPS 2024 as a spotlight.
• Jun. 2024 Our paper “Bridging Dimensions: Confident Reachability for High-Dimensional Controllers” is accepted to FM 2024
• May. 2024 Our paper “Boosting long delayed RL with auxiliary short delay” has been accepted to ICML 2024.
• Feb. 2024 I officially start my position as Associate Professor at Southampton.

Research Projects

• Cross-Layer Uncertainty-Aware Reinforcement Learning for Safe Autonomous Driving, EPSRC ECR International Collaboration Grants (£162k), PI, 07.2024 – 07.2026.

For Prospective Students

I am looking for highly motivated students, who are interested in at least one of the following topics: formal methods, machine learning, and Cyber-Physical systems. The students are expected to have a strong background in at least one of the following areas: computer science/engineering, electrical engineering, mathematics, statistics, and physics. Students with research experience are much preferred.

ECS will provide PhD scholarships for excellent candidates. In addition, there are other scholarship opportunities for home students, students from Commonwealth countries, Chinese students, and other international students. Please do not hesitate to contact me to discuss the scholarship possibility.

Contact Info

Email: chao.huang at soton.ac.uk
Room 4046, Building 53, West Highfield Campus, University Road, SO17 1BJ