Mingzhe Li

Mingzhe Li

Assistant Professor

School of Computing and Information Technology, Great Bay University

Professional Summary

I am currently a US-equivalent Assistant Professor at Great Bay University. Previously, I was a Research Scientist at the Institute of High Performance Computing (IHPC), A*STAR in Singapore, where I led the blockchain research team. I received my Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) in 2022, under Prof. Wei Wang and Prof. Jin Zhang. Prior to that, I received my B.E. in Communication Engineering from the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech).

My work explores blockchain interoperability, sharding protocols, security enhancements, and intelligent blockchain systems. I have spearheaded the development of a new Layer-1 blockchain (the HeLa Network) that launched its mainnet in 2024, and have published extensively in top journals and conferences. In recognition of my research and industry contributions, I was selected for China’s national-level talent recruitment program (Qiming Youth). I am also active in the research community, serving as a reviewer for numerous IEEE/ACM journals and conferences, and co-organizing workshops bridging blockchain and AI.

📢 Hiring: I’m recruiting PhD students, Master’s students, Postdocs, and Research Assistants — see Open Positions.

Download CV

Interests

Blockchain Sharding & Interoperability DeFi Security Consensus & Distributed Systems AI for Blockchain
📚 My Research
My research interests span the broad domain of blockchain systems and Web 3.0, with a particular focus on blockchain interoperability, sharding, security, and intelligent blockchain systems. I am especially interested in designing scalable and efficient blockchain protocols, leveraging AI-driven techniques to enhance security and performance, and exploring decentralized finance (DeFi) and network economics. My work aims to address fundamental challenges in blockchain scalability, security, and usability by developing innovative and practically deployable solutions that push the boundaries of blockchain technology for real-world applications.
🎓 Open Positions

I am recruiting PhD students, Master’s students, Postdoctoral Researchers, and Research Assistants (full-time or part-time). Start dates are flexible; applications are reviewed on a rolling basis.

Research Focus (including but not limited to)

  • Blockchain systems & protocols: sharding, cross-chain interoperability, consensus, verifiable computation/zk, L2 & rollups
  • DeFi security & economics: MEV mitigation, transaction routing and cost optimization, attack detection/traceability
  • AI for Blockchain Systems: on-chain & node telemetry, anomaly detection, time-series forecasting, retrieval-augmented analytics

What We’re Looking For

  • Background in systems/networks/cryptography/data/ML (one or more)
  • Strong implementation skills in Rust / Go / C/C++ / Python (one or more)
  • Curiosity and drive for both research and real-world impact (papers/open-source/prototypes)
  • Bonus (not required): publications, competition results, open-source contributions, or solid engineering experience

What We Offer

  • Close mentorship and collaborative projects that bridge academia and industry
  • Opportunities to build real systems/prototypes (idea → experiments → paper/open-source/prototype)
  • Scholarships/salaries in line with university and project policies (to be discussed)

How to Apply (Rolling Review) Please email mlibn@connect.ust.hk with subject
Application – Position – Your Name – Research Area, and include:

  1. CV (with links to projects/papers/open-source)
  2. Transcript(s) (if available)
  3. One representative paper or code repo (if available)
  4. 1-page research statement (if available)

Strong candidates are welcome to start as RA (onsite or remote) before formal enrollment.
Candidates proposing their own topics or co-advised projects are also welcome.

🗞️ Recent News

  • 02/2026 · Our paper “BriDe Arbitrager: Enhancing Arbitrage in Ethereum 2.0 via Bribery-enabled Delayed Block Production” has been accepted by IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing.

  • 11/2025 · I was selected for China’s national-level talent recruitment program “Qiming Program” (Youth Track).

  • 09/2025 · Our paper “Atomic Smart Contract Interoperability with High Efficiency via Cross-Chain Integrated Execution” has been accepted by IEEE TPDS.

  • 08/2025 · I will formally join Great Bay University at the end of the year.

  • 07/2025 · Our paper “SpiralShard: Highly Concurrent and Secure Blockchain Sharding via Linked Cross-shard Endorsement” has been accepted by IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking.

  • 05/2025 · Our paper “SP-Chain: Boosting Intra-Shard and Cross-Shard Security and Performance in Blockchain Sharding” has been accepted by IEEE IoTJ.

📑 Publications

Published

  • Hulin Yang*†, Mingzhe Li*, Jin Zhang, Alia Asheralieva, Qingsong Wei, and Siow Mong Rick Goh. “BriDe Arbitrager: Enhancing Arbitrage in Ethereum 2.0 via Bribery-enabled Delayed Block Production.” IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (TDSC), 2026.

  • Chaoyue Yin*†, Mingzhe Li*, Jin Zhang, You Lin†, Qingsong Wei, and Siow Mong Rick Goh. “Atomic Smart Contract Interoperability with High Efficiency via Cross-Chain Integrated Execution.” IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS), 2025.

  • You Lin*†, Mingzhe Li*, and Jin Zhang. “SpiralShard: Highly Concurrent and Secure Blockchain Sharding via Linked Cross-shard Endorsement.” IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (TON), 2025.

  • Mingzhe Li, You Lin, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “SP-Chain: Boosting Intra-Shard and Cross-Shard Security and Performance in Blockchain Sharding.” IEEE Internet of Things Journal (IoTJ), 2025.

  • Mingzhe Li, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “Towards Efficient and Deposit-Free Blockchain-Based Spatial Crowdsourcing.” ACM Transactions on Sensor Networks (TOSN), 2024.

  • Mingzhe Li, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “LB-Chain: Load-Balanced and Low-Latency Blockchain Sharding via Account Migration.” IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS), 2023.

  • Mingzhe Li, You Lin, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “CoChain: High Concurrency Blockchain Sharding via Consensus on Consensus.” IEEE INFOCOM 2023 · Acceptance Rate: 19.2%

  • Mingzhe Li, You Lin, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “Jenga: Orchestrating Smart Contracts in Sharding-Based Blockchain for Efficient Processing.” IEEE ICDCS 2022 · Acceptance Rate: 19.9%

  • Mingzhe Li, Jin Zhang, Wei Wang, and Qian Zhang. “Incentivizing WiFi-based Multilateration Location Verification.” IEEE Internet of Things Journal (IoTJ), 2021.

  • Mingzhe Li, Jingrou Wu, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “Towards Privacy-Preserving Task Assignment for Fully Distributed Spatial Crowdsourcing.” IEEE Internet of Things Journal (IoTJ), 2021.

  • Mingzhe Li, Jin Zhang, and Wei Wang. “Task Selection and Scheduling for Food Delivery: A Game-Theoretic Approach.” IEEE GLOBECOM 2018

Preprints & Under Review

  • Kentaroh Toyoda, Xiao Wang, Mingzhe Li, Bo Gao, Yuan Wang, and Qingsong Wei. “Blockchain Data Analysis in the Era of Large-Language Models.” arXiv:2412.09640v1, 2024.

  • Mingzhe Li, Bo Gao, Kentaroh Toyoda, Yechao Yang, Juniarto Samsudin, Haibin Zhang, Sifei Lu, Tai Hou Tng, Kerching Choo, Andy Ting, Siow Mong Rick Goh, and Qingsong Wei. “MStableChain: Towards Multi-Native Stablecoins in EVM-Compatible Blockchain for Stable Fee and Mass Adoption.” arXiv:2410.22100, 2024.

  • Mingzhe Li*, You Lin*†, and Jin Zhang. ”StableShard: Stable and Scalable Blockchain Sharding with High Concurrency via Collaborative Committees.” arXiv:2407.06882v2, 2024.

Legend: † = (co-)supervised student; * = equal contribution.