Hongjin Wu's webpage

Hi! My name is Hongjin Wu. I am a postdoctoral researcher working with Monique Laurent in the Networks & Optimization group at CWI in Amsterdam.

I completed my PhD at ETH Zürich under the supervision of Ulrik Brandes, with Afonso Bandeira as my second advisor.

I am on the job market for postdoctoral positions.
E-Mail: hongjin-wu (at) outlook (dot) com
Curriculum Vitae

I am a mathematician by training, with broad interests in how mathematical structure helps us understand complex systems and makes computationally difficult problems tractable.

Much of my work centers on understanding how graph structure determines the optimization landscape of synchronization problems, using tools from graph theory, low-rank semidefinite optimization, and dynamical systems. I'm also interested in bringing theoretical undertstanding to collective behavior emerges from natural and social systems, system resilliance/robostness, and AI-assisted mathematical discovery.

Publications & preprints

1. Global synchronization & Benign (non-scary) nonconvexity.

Hongjin Wu, Ulrik Brandes. Benign nonconvexity of synchronization landscapes induced by graph skeletons. 2025. Under review. Preprint.
Hongjin Wu, Ulrik Brandes. Global synchronization beyond dense graphs: the case of threshold graphs. 2025. Under review. Preprint.
Hongjin Wu. PhD Thesis: Global synchronization of inductively defined graph classes: a local-to-global perspective.

2. Partial Differential Equations.

Hongjin Wu, Xingfei Xiang. Global boundedness of the curl for a p-curl system in convex domains. 2023. Mathematical Methods in the Applied Sciences.

3. Data Visualization Systems.

Hongjin Wu, Danqing Shi, Nan Chen, Yang Shi, Zhuochen Jin, Nan Cao. VisAct: a visualization design system based on semantic actions. 2019. Journal of Visualization.
Danqing Shi, Yang Shi, Xinyue Xu, Nan Chen, Siwei Fu, Hongjin Wu, Nan Cao. Task-oriented optimal sequencing of visualization charts. 2019. IEEE Symposium on Visualization in Data Science.

Selected presentations

Contributed talk. Threshold graphs are globally synchronizing. Talk at the 6th EUROYoung workshop, Lugano, Switzerland, October 2026.
Global synchronization beyond dense Graphs: the case of threshold graphs. Poster at FoCM 2026, Combinatorics and graph theory session, Vienna, Austria, July 2026. Poster.
Invited talk. Skeleton of globally synchronizing graphs. Talk at the N&O Seminar, CWI, Amsterdam, May 2026. Slides.
Invited talk. Skeleton of globally synchronizing graphs. Talk at the Mittagsseminar, Theory of Combinatorial Algorithms, ETH Zurich, November 2025. Slides.
Poster. Benign nonconvexity and global synchronization with nonlinear interactions. Workshop “Algorithmic Optimization: Tools for AI and Data Science” (50 Years of Yurii Nesterov’s Research), August 2024.
Invited talk. Global boundedness of the curl for a p-curl system in convex domains. Talk at Tsinghua University, March 2019.

Empirical research

Use of network models of epidemic spread and in particular SARS-CoV-2, Link, 2021.
Significant dynamic graphlets mining for clinical phenotype analysis in brain injury data, Link, 2019.

Industrial/practical experience

Intern @Tencent CSIG Jarvis Lab: build a data visualization platform for monitoring anomalies in large-scale internal computing systems.
Research Intern @ Chair of Systems Design
- Topic: Link Prediction and Construction in Temporal Multilayer Networks
- Project report: Genua Analysis
- Advisors: Prof. Frank Schweitzer, Christoph Gote, Christian Zingg

Geduld zu haben gegen alles Ungelöste in Ihrem Herzen und zu versuchen,
die Fragen selbst liebzuhaben.
Leben Sie jetzt die Fragen.