Luyao Zhang

I have an abiding passion for interdisciplinary collaborations, especially for cutting-edge research of both profound insights and practical impacts. My current research interests are at the interplay of computational science and economics around the application of disruptive technologies, including artificial intelligence, blockchain and cryptography, and innovative computing. I have devoted myself to academic research, teaching, and service that truly cultivate interdisciplinary talent, nurture innovation, and advance human civilization.

In The Story of Philosophy, Will Durant says, “We are like Mitya in The Brothers Karamazov—one of those who don’t want millions, but an answer to their questions.” My research is always driven by important research questions. How can we design a mechanism to achieve our desired outcomes, such as efficiency, fairness, and sustainability? Mechanism design theory, introduced by 2007 Nobel Laureates Hurwicz, Maskin, and Myerson, has guided economic institutions worldwide to achieve desirable goals by allocating scarce resources. However, the past decades have witnessed an emerging digital economy with an increasingly complex system. New application scenarios have inspired new questions. How can we analyze big data in a computationally efficient way to draw causal inferences for policy advice? How can we extend the foundation of mechanism design theory to create trust in cyberspace? How can we design experiments to identify more realistic behavioral assumptions underpinning our theory? My quest has taken me through mathematics, psychology, and computational science — and toward a synthesis of disciplines fundamental to the interdisciplinary studies approach. 

• Computational Economics and Social Science: algorithmic game theory, mechanism design, and causal inferences
• Explainable and Cooperative AI: Human-AI interaction, explainable machine learning, and AI ethics
• Crypto and Token Economics: blockchain consensus, governance, and applications
• Behavioral and Experimental Economics: bounded rationality, trust, and cooperation
• Interdisciplinary Big Data: social media, sustainability, and global health