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I am committed to mentoring the next generation of computer scientists and take great pride in the careers my students have gone on to build. I have supervised over 80 students at all levels - from undergraduate research projects to postdoctoral researchers - across The Australian National University (ANU), Victoria University of Wellington (VUW), Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), and Iowa State University of Science and Technology (ISU). My former students and collaborators have gone on to positions at leading companies and universities, including Dr Julian Mackay (Verification Engineer at Kry10; formerly Lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington and MBIE Science Whitinga Fellow), Dr Radu Muschevici (Assistant Professor, University of Nottingham Malaysia), Dr Amos Robinson (Computer Scientist, Microsoft), Justin Lubin (PhD candidate, UC Berkeley), Dr Darya Melicher (Product Manager, San Francisco Bay Area; previously Google), Dr Paley Li (Postdoc, Czech Technical University with Jan Vitek), Dr Hannes Mehnert (Co-founder, Robur cooperative), Felix Shi (Senior Security Architect, Xero), Garming Sam (Security Platform Engineer, Westpac NZ), and Constantine Dymnikov (Solutions Architect, NZ Ministry of Justice).

As Associate Director of HDR at the ANU School of Computing (2023 - 2025), I managed admissions, supervision, and progress for over 200 PhD students. I created a monitoring app to proactively track student progress and wellbeing, revamped the admissions and scholarship process, and ensured regular six-monthly reviews across all research clusters. Previously, as Postgraduate Coordinator at VUW (2012 - 2016), I chaired every PhD proposal meeting and managed all thesis student matters across an interdisciplinary research programme, earning a commendation from the BE Review Panel in 2016.

Interested in Joining the Group?

I am always looking for motivated graduate students to work on programming language design, type systems, software verification, and related areas.

External applicants: for me to consider you (and reply), the first paragraph of your email must name at least one referee who knows you, is willing to provide a reference, and has published at one of the four major ACM SIGPLAN conferences (POPL, PLDI, ICFP, or OOPSLA) or a similarly strong venue such as CAV; emails without this are filed away without a response. Students already at my institution are exempt — just email me or come and chat in person.

How to Apply ANU PhD Scholarships

Primary Supervisor

Yan Liu
Yan Liu
Fiducia
Research Fellow (Postdoc), ANU, 2025 - 2027
Sasha Pak
Partial Borrows in Rust Verified with Mechanised Aeneas
PhD 2024 - 2027 | Co-supervised with Ilya Sergey (NUS), Fabian Muehlboeck
Abolfazl Sharifi
Verification of Concurrent Data Structures in Rust using Iris
PhD 2026 - 2030 | Co-supervisor TBC
Edwin Singh
Why Language Designers Do Modules The Way They Do (Grounded Theory Study)
PhD 2022 - 2028 (part time) | Co-supervised with Jennifer Ferreira (VUW), Alwen Tiu
Billy Jaffray
Verifying Lock Free Data Structures using Verus
Honours 2026
Charlotte Fulham
Verified Parser in Rust for Fiducia
Honours (3rd-year project) 2026 S2 - 2027 S1

Supervisory Panel Member (Not Primary Supervisor)

Haoyu Wu
Haoyu Wu
Nomnom Type Checking
PhD 2025 - 2028 | Primary supervisor: Fabian Muehlboeck
Carlo Zancanaro
Gradual Typing and Type Polymorphism
PhD 2026 - 2029 | Primary supervisor: Fabian Muehlboeck
Alyssa Herald
Security of Capabilities in CHERI
Honours 2025 - 2026 | Primary supervisor: Alwen Tiu
Julia Groß
Energy Trading in Blockchains
PhD 2024 - 2030 (part time, ANU) | Primary supervisor: Ramesh Rayudu (VUW); with Jennifer Ferreira (VUW)
Maximilian Kodetzki
Maximillian Kodetzki
X-by-Construction
PhD 2022 - 2026 (KIT) | Primary supervisor: Ina Schaefer
Jakob Jerebica
Formalisation of Pancake by Construction with Real World Driver Examples
PhD 2026 - 2030 (KIT) | Primary supervisor: Ina Schaefer; with Michael Norrish

Completed Students

  1. Charlotte Fulham (RA, June - September 2026), Fiducia Microkit Backend, Co-Supervised with Yan Liu
  2. N Shalini Srinivasan (RA, June - August 2026), Fiducia Model Checking, Co-Supervised with Yan Liu
  3. David Young (PhD 2023 - 2026, part time, Kansas), PCM's for Abstracted Layouts across Multiple Fields: from Heaps to Quantum
  4. Jack Hackshaw (Honours 2025 - 2026), Pancake in Loom in Lean
  5. Rishita Sarkar (BAC R&D 2025 - 2026), Quantum Computing Testing, Co-Supervised with Liyi Li
  6. Libby Boas (PhB ASC 2025 - 2026), Quantum Computing Distributed Computation, Co-Supervised with Liyi Li
  7. Charlotte Fulham (Engineering ASC 2026 S1), Fiducia to Microkit Bridge Implementation, Co-Supervised with Yan Liu
  8. Zara Hassan (PhD 2023 - 2025), Reproducibility Debt in Scientific Software, Co-Supervised with Christoph Treude (SMU), Michael Norrish, Graham Williams, now working with the Australian Research Data Commons
  9. Fahimeh Hoseinnia (PhD 2023 - 2026 at VUW), Agricultural Pollution Data Marketplace and DAOs, Co-Supervised with Jennifer Ferreira, James Quilty, now Data Analyst at Arthur D Riley & Co, NZ
  10. Ari Gilchrist (ASC), Qiskit to QGen Translation
  11. Iko-Ojo Simon (PhD 2023 - 2025), Co-Supervised with Hanna Suominen, Chirath Hettiarachchi, and Fatemeh H. Fard at UBC, Algorithmic Debt, now Postdoc at the University of São Paulo, Brazil
  12. Jakob Jerebica (Masters 2024 - 2025 at KIT), Co-Supervised with Ina Schaefer and Michael Norrish
  13. Matt Britton (Honours in 2024 - 2025), Rust Refactoring
  14. Dariy Guzairov (Honours in 2025), Co-Supervised with Alwen Tiu, CHERI Exploits
  15. Nicholas Arvanitellis (ASC Project in 2025), Co-Supervised with Alwen Tiu, Obfuscation Exploits
  16. Lachlan Graham (Honours in 2024), Co-Supervised with Alwen Tiu, Capabilities from High Level to Hardware
  17. Zack Noyes (Honours in 2024), Co-Supervised with Alwen Tiu, Information Flow
  18. Ziling Ouyang (Honours in 2024), Co-Supervised with Fabian Mühlböck, Using Redex for Safe Programming Languages Research: A Case Study in System C
  19. Matthew Gates (BAC RnD Project in 2024 S2), Coq Formalisation of Tagged Objects
  20. Amos Robinson (Postdoc 2023 - 2025 at ANU), Higher Level Invariants with Lark
  21. Guanming Ou (Honours at ANU in 2023), Co-Supervised with Fabian Mühlböck and Jonathan Aldrich at CMU, Abstract and Algebraic Effects in Wyvern (Theory)
  22. Ziling Ouyang (Third Year Project at ANU in 2023), Co-Supervised with Fabian Mühlböck and Jonathan Aldrich at CMU, Abstract and Algebraic Effects in Wyvern (Implementation)
  23. Richard Susilo (Honours at ANU in 2023), Co-Supervised with Fabian Mühlböck, IDE-Driven Partial Semantics for Wyvern
  24. Jaxon Kneipp (Honours at ANU in 2023), Co-Supervised with Michael Anenburg, Visualisation App for REM Discovery
  25. Aniket Shaha (RA via FRT 2023), Classification of CVE's to Identify the Use for Capability-Enabled Modules in Language Security
  26. Abhaas Goyal (Honours at ANU in 2022 - 2023), Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich at CMU, Usability Study of Capable vs Incapable Modules
  27. Naisheng Liang (Honours at ANU in 2023), Breaking or Security of IntelliJ Plugins via Language Security Techniques
  28. Xinyi (Kayla) Li (RA via Google 2023), Co-Supervised with Matthew Roberts at Macquire University, Survey of FM Curriculum in Australasia
  29. Tobias Runge (PhD Thesis in 2019 - 2022 (based at KIT and formerly at TU Braunschweig), CbC with Ownership and Traits, Co-Supervised with Ina Schaefer and Marco Servetto
  30. Leon Bowie (RA in 2021, 2022), AgriDataTrade Marketplace with N Leaching Sensor Network for NZ Farms
  31. Sophia Roshal (RA in 2021 and 2022 (based at CMU and Cornell)), Decidable Nominal Subtyping in Wyvern, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich
  32. Richard Susilo (Undergraduate Research Project in 2022 at ANU)
  33. Nik Bielski (PhD Thesis attempted in 2022 - 2023 (part time, suspended in 2023)), Co-Supervised with Bastiaan Kleijn at VUW and Heyang (Thomas) Li at UC
  34. Manish Singh (PhD Thesis attempted in 2017 - 2022 (part time, suspended in 2021)), Lock Free Balanced BST's, Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  35. Rowan Rathod (ENGR489 attempted in 2021), Automated Farm Sensing on a Robonomics Platform
  36. Samantha Hau (ENGR489 in 2021), WFA Events App
  37. Dominic Tjiptono (ENGR489 in 2021), Haskell in the Real World, Co-Supervised with James Noble
  38. Maxwell Clarke (2020/2021 Summer RA based at VUW), Wyvern Effects and FFI
  39. Timothy Mou (2020 Summer RA based at CMU), Wyvern Decidable Nominal Type Member Subtyping Implementation, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  40. Anlun Xu (Masters at CMU in 2020), Bounded Abstract Effects, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  41. Carl Bennett (ENGR489 in 2019), A Study In Mobile App and Web Frameworks
  42. Cameron Laing (ENGR489 in 2019), Reproducing an Existing Empirical PL or SE Study
  43. Billy Zhu (Masters at CMU in 2018/2019), Nominal Type Members, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  44. Henry Nelson (2018 Summer RA based at CMU), Wyvern JavaScript Backend and Bytecode, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  45. Justin Lubin (2018 Summer RA based at CMU), Wyvern Effects, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  46. Andre Westerlund (ENGR489 in 2018), Wyvern Secure Web Server, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  47. Tu Dinh (ENGR489 in 2018), Wyvern REPL, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  48. Zacary Paynter (ENGR489 in 2018, Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves), Non Blocking Priority Queues Review and Performance Comparison
  49. Miten Chauhan (ENGR489 in 2017), Industrial Project with PlanIT
  50. Neel Patel (ENGR489 in 2017), Industrial Project with PlanIT
  51. Callum Gil (ENGR489 in 2017), Industrial Project with Haunt
  52. Baptiste Pauget (RA in February - July 2017, Whiley to FPGA, Co-Supervised with David Pearce)
  53. Aaron Craig (COMP489 2016/2017, Effects and Capabilities in Wyvern, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich from CMU and Lindsay Groves)
  54. Robbie McKinstry (RA based at CMU in 2016, Wyvern Implementation, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich from CMU)
  55. Luke Inkster (ENGR489 in 2016, Inheritance vs Delegation Study, Co-Supervised with James Noble)
  56. Daniel Campbell (COMP489 in 2016, Macros in Rust, Co-Supervised with Nick Cameron from Mozilla Corporation)
  57. Aaron Craig (Summer RA in 2015/2016, Verification Support for Wyvern, Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich from CMU and Lindsay Groves)
  58. Daniel Campbell (Summer RA in 2015/2016, Tool Support for Macros in Rust, Co-Supervised with Nick Cameron from Mozilla Corporation)
  59. Garming Sam (BE Honours in 2015, Refactorings in Rust, Co-Supervised with Nick Cameron from Mozilla Corporation)
  60. Jui Deshpande (BE Honours in 2015, Automatic Data Quality Analysis Tool for Airways NZ), Co-Supervised with Hui Ma
  61. Mate Antunovic (BE Honours attempted in 2015, RR, Co-Supervised with Robert O'Callahan from Mozilla Corporation)
  62. Julian Mackay (PhD Thesis in 2015 - 2019, Wyvern Type Members), Co-Supervised with Jonathan Aldrich (CMU) and Lindsay Groves
  63. Darya Melicher (PhD Thesis in 2013 - 2019, Wyvern Modules, CMU), Primary Supervisor is Jonathan Aldrich (CMU)
  64. Troy Shaw (BE Honours Thesis in 2014, Tagged Types Implementation for Wyvern)
  65. Tim Sullivan (BSc Honours Thesis in 2014, Interpreter for Grace), Co-Supervised with James Noble
  66. Ahmed Khalifa (PhD Thesis from 2010 to 2013, Ownership and Immutability in the Real World), Co-Supervised with James Noble
  67. Morgan Atkins (MSc Thesis in 2012, Survey of Concurrency Features in OO Programming Languages), Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  68. Julian Mackay (MSc Thesis in 2012, Mechanised Theorem Proving in COQ for Ownership and Immutability), Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  69. Morgan Atkins (RA in summer 2010/2011, X10 Programming Language and Clocked References)
  70. Morgan Atkins (BSc Honours Thesis in 2011, X10 Programming Language)
  71. Julian Mackay (BSc Honours Thesis in 2011, Mechanised Theorem Proving in COQ), Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  72. Felix Shi (BE 400-level Thesis in 2011, JavaScript Type Inference), Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  73. Jan Larres (MSc Thesis in 2011, Performance Variations Analysis in Mozilla Firefox), Co-Supervised with Yuichi Hirose
  74. Constantine Dymnikov (MSc Thesis in 2011, Modular Ownership Inference), Co-Supervised with David Pearce
  75. Hien Tran (BE 400-level Thesis in 2010, Automated Analysis of Map Labelling for GIS Users), Co-Supervised with Mairead de Roiste from SGEES
  76. Hannes Mehnert (RA in summer 2009/2010, Ownership and Immutability, Co-Supervised with Nicholas Cameron)
  77. Constantine Dymnikov (RA in 2009/2010, Ownership Inference)
  78. Andrew Walbran (RA in 2009, OIGJ Compiler)
  79. Gustav van der Merwe (RA in 2009, Ownership, Immutability and GADT's)
  80. Paley Li (BSc Honours Thesis in 2008, Ownership and Immutability), Co-Supervised with James Noble and Lindsay Groves
  81. Andrew Childs (BSc Honours Thesis in 2008, Eliminating Redundant Null Checks), Co-Supervised with Lindsay Groves
  82. Paley Li (RA in 2008, Ownership and Immutability)
  83. Radu Muschevici (MSc Thesis in 2007/2008, Multimethods), Co-Supervised with James Noble
  84. Neil Ramsay (BIT Thesis in 2007, Software Visualisation), Co-Supervised with Stuart Marshall
  85. Leo Gui (BIT Thesis attempted in 2007, Usability of Teaching Tools), Co-Supervised with Stuart Marshall
  86. Christo Fogelberg (RA in 2007, Ownership in Collections)