Yang Cai

Yang Cai is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Yale University with a secondary appointment in Economics. He is the Research Director for Computer Science at the Center for Algorithms, Data, & Market Design at Yale (CADMY) and a member of the Institute for Foundations of Data Science (FDS). His research focuses on theoretical computer science, economics and computation, and machine learning, with contributions to mechanism design, optimization, and game theory.

Education: Ph.D. in Computer Science from MIT (2013), B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Peking University (2008). Awards include the Sloan Research Fellowship (2019), William Dawson Scholar Award (2016), and Simons-Berkeley Research Fellowship (2015).

Teaching includes courses like Economics and Computation (ECON 425/CPSC 455) and Intensive Algorithms (CPSC 366). His recent publications explore topics such as algorithmic game theory, learning in multi-player games, and optimization frameworks for non-convex settings.

Key research trends in his work include tractable equilibria in non-concave games, last-iterate convergence in learning algorithms, and the intersection of machine learning with market design. He leads efforts in algorithmic mechanisms for multi-item auctions and long-term revenue optimization in ad markets.