Nengkun Yu's homepage
Associate Professor, SUNY Empire Innovation Scholar
Department of Computer Science Room 153.
Stony Brook, NY 11794-2424
News
I have PhD/postdoc positions this year. To apply, send me your CV to nengkun.yu@cs.stonybrook.edu.
I am always looking for highly motivated students who want to pursue a PhD in computer science, especially in quantum computing and programming language. All backgrounds (math, physics, computer science, electrical engineering, etc.) are welcome to apply. Financial supports (e.g., RAship and TAship) are available to cover tuition fees, stipends, and a competitive benefits package.
Apr/2022: invited as PC of 20th Asian Symposium on Programming Languages and Systems (APLAS), which will be co-located with SPLASH 2022.
March/2022: Our paper ``On Incorrectness Logic for Quantum Programs" is accepted by OOPSLA, 2022. Congratulations Peng!
Feb/2022: I am invited as PC of the 2022 IEEE International Conference on Quantum Computing & Engineering (QCE).
Dec/2021: our paper ``Verification of Continuous-time Markov Chains" is accepted by TACAS, 2022.
Dec/2021: invited as PC of 3rd International Workshop on Quantum Software Engineering (Q-SE 2022), co-located with the 44th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2022).
Oct/2021: I receive the Chris Wallace Award for Outstanding Research 2021.
Oct/2021: Co-teaching 41173 ``Quantum Software and Programming" with Prof Yuan Feng.
Sep/2021: Our paper ``Protocols for Packet Quantum Network Intercommunication," is accepted by IEEE Transactions on Quantum Engineering.
June/2021: Our paper ``Model Checking Quantum Continuous-Time Markov Chains", is accepted by the 32nd International Conference on Concurrency Theory (CONCUR), 2021.
May/2021: Our paper ``Quantum Abstract Interpretation" is selected as an ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award at the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation (PLDI) 2021.
April/2021: Our paper ```Discrimination of quantum states under locality constraints in the many-copy setting", is accepted by the 2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), 2021.
April/2021: Short course ``Introduction to Quantum Hoare Logic(s)" in UTS.
March/2021: Our paper ``A Quantum Interpretation of Bunched Logic & Quantum Separation Logic" is accepted by the 36th ACM/IEEE Annual Symposium on Logic in Computer Science (LICS).
March/2021: Our paper ``Quantum Abstract Interpretation" is accepted by the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation (PLDI) 2021.
March/2021: Our paper ``When is the Chernoff Exponent for Quantum Operations finite?" is accepted by IEEE Transactions on Information Theory.
Nov/2020: Our paper ``Poq: Projection-based Runtime Assertions for Debugging on a Quantum Computer" is selected as an ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award at the Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA) 2020 and has been featured on the SIGPLAN blog. This is the first quantum paper selected as a distinguished paper award in top PL conferences.
Nov/2020: My paper ``Sample Efficient Identity Testing and Independence Testing of Quantum States," will appear at the 12th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science (ITCS) 2021.
Education
2008.9-2013.7, Ph.D. in Computer Science, Department of Computer Science and Technology,
Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
2004.08-2008.7, Bachelor in Computer Science, Department of Computer Science and Technology,
Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
Research Experience
2022, associate Professor, Stony Brook University.
2016-2022, Chancellor postdoc--Lecturer --Senior Lecturer--associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney.
2014-2016, Postdoc of Institute for Quantum Computing, Department of Combinatorics \& Optimization, University of Waterloo.
Current Research Interests
Quantum Programming Paradigms, Quantum Property Testing
Honors, Awards
2021.10, the Chris Wallace Award for Outstanding Research 2021. This is the most prestigious award for mid career computer scientists in Australasia. 1 awardee annually.
2021. 05, ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award at the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation (PLDI) 2021.
2020. 11, ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award at the Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA) 2020.
2018.09, J G Russell Award of Australian Academy of Science. 3-4 awardees in the sciences among Australian researchers annually.
2013, Outstanding graduate award of Beijing City.
2013, Outstanding graduate award of Tsinghua University.
2013, Boeing Scholarships.
2012, National Scholarships of China.
Grants
2021.01-2023.12, Coupling Techniques for Reasoning about Quantum Programs, with Prof Mingsheng Ying.
2018.11, AI meets Quantum: Quantum algorithms for knowledge representation and learning, Partner Organisation: Baidu Online Network Technology (Beijing) Co., Ltd. (Baidu Contract Research), with Prof Sanjiang Li, Prof Yuan Feng.
2018.01, Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) of Australian Research Council (ARC).
Publication
Selected Refereed Conference articles
P. Yan, H, Jiang, N. Yu, ``On Incorrectness Logic for Quantum Programs" Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA), 2022.
J. Guan, N. Yu, "Verification of Continuous-time Markov Chains", the 28th International Conference on Tools and Algorithms for the Construction and Analysis of Systems (TACAS), 2022.
M. Xu, J. Mei, J. Guan, N. Yu, ``Model Checking Quantum Continuous-Time Markov Chains", the 32nd International Conference on Concurrency Theory (CONCUR), 2021.
H. Cheng, A. Winter, N. Yu, ``Discrimination of quantum states under locality constraints in the many-copy setting", 2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), 2021.
L. Zhou, G. Barthe, J. Hsu, M. Ying, N. Yu, ``A Quantum Interpretation of Bunched Logic for Quantum Separation Logic", the 36th Annual Symposium on Logic in Computer Science (LICS' 2021), 1-14 .
N. Yu, J. Palsberg, ``Quantum Abstract Interpretation", the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation, (PLDI' 2021), Pages 542–558.
ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award.
N. Yu, ``Sample Efficient Identity Testing and Independence Testing of Quantum States," The 12th Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science (ITCS), pp 11:1-11:20,
2021.
G. Li, L. Zhou, N. Yu*, Y. Ding, M. Ying, Y. Xie, ``Poq: Projection-based Runtime Assertions for Debugging on a Quantum Computer," Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA), pp 1–29, 2020.
ACM SIGPLAN distinguished paper award.
G Barthe, J Hsu, M Ying, N. Yu, L Zhou, ``Relational proofs for quantum programs," Proceedings of the 47th ACM SIGPLAN Symposium on Principles of Programming Languages, (POPL), pp 1–29, Jan 19 - Jan 25, 2020, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States.
Li Zhou, N. Yu and Mingsheng Ying, ``An Applied Quantum Hoare Logic,'' Proceedings of the 40th ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation, (PLDI), Pages 1149–1162, June 22 - June 26, 2019, Phoenix, Arizona, United States.
D. Leung, A. Nayak, A. Shayeghi, D. Touchette, P. Yao, N. Yu,``Capacity Approaching Codes for Low Noise Interactive Quantum Communication", Proceedings of the 50th ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC), Los Angeles, CA, USA, June 25 - 29, ACM, pp 339-352, 2018.
A. Anshu, D. Touchette, P. Yao, N. Yu, ``Exponential separation between quantum communication complexity and information complexity," Proceedings of the 49th ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC), Montreal, Canada, June 19 - 23, pp 277-288, 2017.
S. X. Cui, Z. Ji, N. Yu, and B. Zeng, ``Quantum Capacities for Entanglement Networks," 2016 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory(ISIT), Barcelona, Spain, July 10-15, pp 1685-1689, 2016.
J. Haah, A. W. Harrow, Z. Ji, X. Wu and N. Yu, ``Sample-optimal tomography of quantum states," Proceedings of the 48th ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC), Cambridge, MA, USA, June 19-21, ACM, pp 913-925, 2016.
Y. Qiao, X. Sun and N. Yu, ``Determinantal complexities and field extensions," 2013 International Symposium on Algorithms and Computation (ISAAC), Hong Kong, December 16-18, Springer LNCS 8283, pp. 119-129, 2013.
S. Ying, Y. Feng, N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Reachability probabilities of quantum Markov chains," 2013 International Conference on Concurrency Theory (CONCUR), Buenos Aires, Argentina, August 27-30, Springer LNCS 8052, pp 334-348, 2013.
Y. Feng, N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Reachability analysis of recursive quantum Markov chains," 2013 International Symposium on Mathematical Foundations of Computer Science (MFCS), Klosterneuburg, Austria, August 26-30, Springer LNCS 8087, pp 385-396, 2013.
M. Ying, Y. Feng and N. Yu, ``Quantum information-flow security: Noninterference and access control," 2013 IEEE Conference on Computer Security Foundations Symposium (CSF), New Orleans, USA, June 26-28, pp 130-144, 2013.
N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Reachability and termination analysis of concurrent quantum programs," 2012 International Conference on Concurrency Theory (CONCUR), Newcastle upon Tyne, September 3-8, Springer LNCS 7454, pp. 69-83, 2012.
Selected Refereed Journal articles
N. Yu, L Zhou, S Ying, M Ying, ``Quantum Earth mover’s distance, No-go Quantum Kantorovich-Rubinstein theorem, and Quantum Marginal Problem ," Journal of Mathematical Physics 63 (10), 102201, 2022.
P. Yan, N. Yu, "The QQUIC Transport Protocol: Quantum assisted UDP Internet Connections", Entropy, 2022.
N. Yu, C Lai, L Zhou, ``Protocols for Packet Quantum Network Intercommunication," vol. 2, pages 1-9, IEEE Transactions on Quantum Engineering.
J. Xie, S. Huang, L. Zhou, A. Zhang, H. Xu, M. Yung, N. Yu, L. Zhang, ``Entirety of Quantum Uncertainty and Its Experimental Verification,” 38 070303, Chinese Physics Letters, Editors Suggestion.
N. Yu, L Zhou, ``When is the Chernoff Exponent for Quantum Operations finite? ," accepted by IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 67, iss. 67, pp. 4517 - 4523 (2021).
D. Leung, A. Winter, N. Yu , ``LOCC protocols with bounded width per round optimize convex functions", Reviews in Mathematical Physics, 2150013 (2021).
N. Yu, ``Entanglement Verification, with or without tomography," IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 66, issue. 10, pp. 6369 - 6377 (2020).
H. Xu, F. Xu, T. Theurer, D. Egloff, Z. Liu, N. Yu, M B. Plenio, L. Zhang, ``Experimental quantification of coherence of a tunable quantum detector,” Physical Review Letters, 125, 060404, (2020).
Y Qiao, X Sun, N. Yu, ``Characterization of multipartite entanglement in terms of local transformations," IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications 38 (3), 568-574 2020.
L Zhou, S Ying, N. Yu, M Ying, ``Quantum Coupling and Strassen Theorem," Theoretical Computer Science, Volume 802, Pages 67-76 (2020).
N. Yu, R. Duan and Q. Xu, ``Bounds on the distance between a unital quantum channel and the convex hull of unitary channels," IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 63, no. 2, pp. 1299-1310 (2017).
N. Yu, ``Separability of mixture of Dicke States,'' Physical Review A, vol. 94, no. 6, art. 060101 (2016) (Rapid Communications).
T. Xin, D. Lu, J. Klassen, N. Yu, Z. Ji, J. Chen, X. Ma, G. Long, J. Baugh, B. Zeng, R. Laflamme, ``Quantum state tomography via reduced density matrices," Physical Review Letters, vol. 118, no. 2, art. 020401 (2017).
J. Chen, Z. Ji, N. Yu, B. Zeng, ``Entanglement depth for symmetric states," Physical Review A, vol. 94, no. 4, art. 042333 (2016).
D. Leung, and N. Yu, ``Maximum privacy without coherence, zero-error,"Journal of Mathematical Physics, vol. 57, no. 9, art. 092202 (2016).
D. Lu, T. Xin, N. Yu, Z. Ji, J. Chen, G. Long, J. Baugh, X. Peng, B. Zeng, R. Laflamme,` `Tomography is necessary for universal entanglement detection with single-copy observables," Physical Review Letters, vol. 116, no. 23, art. 230501 (2016).
J. Chen, Z. Ji, N. Yu, B. Zeng, ``Detecting consistency of overlapping quantum marginals by separability," Physical Review A, vol. 93, no. 3, art. 032105 (2015).
J. Chen, Z. Ji, C. Li, Y. Poon, Y. Shen, N. Yu, B. Zeng and D. Zhou, ``Principle of maximum entropy and quantum phase transitions," New Journal of Physics, vol. 17, no. 8, art. 083019 (2015).
S. X. Cui, N. Yu and B. Zeng, ``Generalized graph states based on Hadamard matrices," Journal of Mathematical Physics, vol. 56, no. 7, art. 072201 (2015)
Y. Zhao, N. Yu, P. Kurzynski, G. Xiang, C. Li and G. Guo, ``Experimental realisation of generalised qubit measurements based on quantum walks," Physical Review A, vol. 91, no. 4, art. 042101 (2015).
S. Bandyopadhyay, A. Cosentino, N. Johnston, V. Russo, J. Watrous, and N. Yu, ``Limitations on separable measurements by convex optimization," IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 61, no. 6, pp. 3593-3604(2015).
N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Optimal simulation of Deutsch gates and the Fredkin gate," Physical Review A, vol. 91, no. 3, art. 032302 (2015).
T. Chen, N. Yu and T. Han, ``Continuous-time orbit problems are decidable in polynomial-time," Information Processing Letters, vol. 115, no. 1, 11-14 (2015).
M. Ying, Y. Li, N. Yu and Y. Feng,``Model-checking linear-time properties of quantum systems," ACM Transactions on Computational Logic, vol. 15, no. 22, iss. 3 (2014).
N. Yu, C. Guo and R. Duan, ``Obtaining a W state from a Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state via stochastic local operations and classical communication with a rate approaching unity," Physical Review Letters, vol. 112, no. 16, art. 160401 (2014).
Y. Feng, N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Model checking quantum Markov chains", Journal of Computer and System Sciences, vol. 79, iss. 7, pp. 1181-1198 (2014).
N. Yu, R. Duan and M. Ying, ``Distinguishability of quantum states by positive operator-valued measures with positive partial transpose," IEEE Transactions on Information Theory , vol. 60, no. 4, pp. 2069-2079 (2014).
Y. Li, N. Yu and M. Ying, ``Termination of nondeterministic quantum programs," Acta Informatica, vol. 51, iss. 1, pp. 1-24 (2014).
M. Ying, N. Yu, Y. Feng and R. Duan, ``Verification of quantum programs," Science of Computer Programming, vol. 78, iss. 9, pp. 1679-1700 (2013).
N. Yu, R. Duan and M. Ying, ``Five two-qubit gates are necessary for implementing the Toffoli gate,'' Physical Review A, vol. 88, no. 1, art. 010304 (2013) (Rapid Communications).
N. Yu, ``Multipartite W-type state is determined by its single particle reduced density matrices,'' Physical Review A, vol. 87, no. 5, art. 052310 (2013).
N. Yu, R. Duan and M. Ying, ``Four locally indistinguishable ququad-ququad orthogonal maximally entangled states," Physical Review Letters, vol. 109, no. 2, art. 020506 (2012).
N. Yu, R. Duan and M. Ying,``Any $2\otimes n$ subspace is locally distinguishable," Physical Review A, vol. 84, no. 1, art. 012304 (2011).
N. Yu, R. Duan and M. Ying,``Optimal simulation of a perfect entangler," Physical Review A, vol. 81, no. 3, art. 032328 (2010).
N. Yu, E. Chitambar, C. Guo, and R. Duan, ``Tensor rank of the tripartite state $|W>^\otimes n$," Physical Review A, vol. 81, no. 1, art. 014301 (2010).
Other Publications
X Chen, B Cheng, X Nie, N. Yu, MH Yung, X Peng, ``Experimental Cryptographic Verification for Near-Term Quantum Cloud Computing," Science Bulletin 66 (1), 23-28 (2021).
J. Chen, C. Guo, Z. Ji, Y. Poon, N. Yu, B. Zeng, J. Zhou, ``Joint product numerical range and geometry of reduced density matrices", Science China Physics, Mechanics and Astronomy, vol. 60, no. 2, art. 1869- 1927 (2017). [Invited paper]
J. Chen, Z. Ji, Z. Liu, X. Qi, N. Yu, B. Zeng, D. Zhou, ``Physical origins of ruled surfaces on the reduced density matrices geometry", Science China Physics, Mechanics and Astronomy, vol. 60, no. 2, art. 1869-1927 (2016). [Invited paper]
H. Wang, W. Zheng, N. Yu, K. Li, D. Lu, T. Xin, C. Li, Z. Ji, D. Kribs, B. Zeng, X. Peng, J. Du, ``Quantum state and process tomography via adaptive measurements," Science China Physics, Mechanics and Astronomy, vol. 59, art. 100313 (2016).
M. Ying, Y. Feng, R. Duan, Y. Li, and N. Yu, ``Quantum programming: From theories to implementations," Chinese Science Bulletin, vol. 57, no. 16, art. 1903-1909 (2012).
[Invited paper]
Preprint
N. Yu, "Sample optimal Quantum identity testing via Pauli Measurements ", arXiv:2009.11518.
N. Yu, "Sample efficient tomography via Pauli Measurements", arXiv:2009.04610.
N. Yu,``Quantum Temporal Logic," arXiv:1908.00158.
M Ying, N. Yu, Y Feng, ``Alternation in quantum programming: from superposition of data to superposition of programs," arXiv:1402.5172.