Junrui LiuEmail / Google Scholar / GitHub / Bluesky I am a 5th-year Computer Science PhD student at UC Santa Barbara, where I do research at the intersection of programming languages, formal methods, and software engineering. I am advised by Yu Feng. Prior to this, I received my undergraduate degree from Vassar College, and my M.S. from Yale University. News: I'm on the academic job market for tenure-track faculty positions in Computer Science! Check out my CV, teaching statement, and research statement. |
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Research § Teaching § Personal § Blog
Research
I'm interested in helping programmers build provably correct, efficient software, using techniques from programming languages and formal methods. To achieve this, I work on:
- developing program synthesizers that generate correct-by-construction software automatically
- formally verifying that existing software conforms to logical specifications
- designing domain-specific languages to make it easier to build reliable software for emerging domains.
Peer-Reviewed Publications
("+" means equal contribution)
Tabby: A Synthesis-Aided Compiler for High-Performance Zero-Knowledge Proof CircuitsJunrui Liu, Jiaxin Song, Yanning Chen, Hanzhi Liu, Hongbo Wen, Luke Pearson, Yanju Chen, Yu Feng OOPSLA'25 (to appear) |
Refinement Types for VisualizationJunrui Liu + Jingtao Xia, Nicholas Brown, Yanju Chen, Yu Feng ASE'24 |
Certifying Zero-Knowledge Circuits with Refinement TypesJunrui Liu, Ian Kretz, Hanzhi Liu, Bryan Tan, Jonathan Wang, Yi Sun, Luke Pearson, Anders Miltner, Isil Dillig, Yu Feng S&P'24 |
Conflict-Driven Synthesis for Layout EnginesJunrui Liu, Yanju Chen, Eric Atkinson, Yu Feng, Rastislav Bodik PLDI'23 |
Learning Contract Invariants Using Reinforcement LearningJunrui Liu + Yanju Chen, Bryan Tan, Isil Dillig, Yu Feng ASE'22 |
Tree Traversal Synthesis Using Domain-Specific Symbolic CompilationYanju Chen, Junrui Liu, Yu Feng, Rastislav Bodik ASPLOS'22 |
Conference Presentation
Tessel: An Optimizing Compiler for Efficient Zero-Knowledge CircuitsJunrui Liu, Jiaxin Song, Yanning Chen, Hanzhi Liu, Hongbo Wen, Yanju Chen, Yu Feng. SBC'25 |
Manuscripts
A Study of HTTP/2's Server Push Performance PotentialRui Meireles, Junrui Liu, Peter Steenkiste arXiv manuscript |
Teaching
Instructor 🧑🏫
Teaching Assistant 🧑💻
Awards 🏆
- Teaching Assistant of the Year, UCSB Department of Computer Science, 2025
- Outstanding Teaching Assistant, UCSB College of Engineering, 2024 [press]
- Outstanding Teaching Assistant, UCSB College of Engineering, 2023 [press]
Certificates and Training ✅
- Certificate in College and University Teaching, UCSB
- Lead TA Institute, UCSB
- Summer Teaching Institute for Associates, UCSB
Talks, Tutorials & Workshops
- Leading Computer-Based Lab Workshop (UCSB Teaching Assistant Orientation 2025)
- Polymorphism, Curry-Howard, and Program Verification (guest lecture for CS162 @ UCSB)
- Formal Verification for Zero-Knowledge Proofs (Applied ZK Workshop @ SBC'22)
- Introduction to Interactive Theorem Proving in Coq (0xPARC Summer Residency 2022)
- Refinement Types and Program Verification (guest lecture for CS162 @ UCSB)
Personal
I enjoy playing music, and am currently studying the carillon with Wesley Arai. I occasionally post my progress videos here. Previously, I studied organ with Gail Archer. I'm also mildly weeb, enjoying owarai, radio, and anime.
Blog
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