Zhiyuan Tan

Dr. Zhiyuan Tan is an Associate Professor in the School of Computing at Edinburgh Napier University (ENU), specializing in cybersecurity research. He holds a PhD in Computer Systems from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Australia (2014), an MEng from Beijing University of Technology, China (2008), and a BEng with high distinction from North-eastern University, China (2005). Before joining ENU in 2016, Dr. Tan held research positions at the University of Twente (Netherlands), University of Technology Sydney (Australia), and La Trobe University (Australia).

Dr. Tan's research focuses on cybersecurity, machine learning, data analytics, virtualisation, and cyber-physical systems. His work has resulted in over 44 scholarly publications with an H-Index of 13 and more than 830 citations according to Google Scholar. His recent publications demonstrate a continued focus on network security, intrusion detection systems, and the application of machine learning techniques to cybersecurity challenges, with publications spanning from 2022-2025 in top venues including IEEE Transactions and international conferences.

Dr. Tan has received significant research funding, including AUD 27,800 from CSIRO and UTS for autonomous network intrusion detection research and £6,987 from ENU for securing future 5G health care systems. His research has been recognized with awards including the National Research Award 2017 from the Research Council of the Sultanate of Oman, a Best Paper Award, and the Kaspersky Lab's Annual Student Cyber Security Conference Finalist Award.

• National Research Award 2017 from the Research Council of the Sultanate of Oman
• Best Paper Award
• Kaspersky Lab's Annual Student Cyber Security Conference Finalist Award

Dr. Tan has mentored 9 PhD students over the past 5 years, with 6 successfully completing their studies. His students have produced 12 journal and 10 conference publications. He has also served as an editorial board member for international journals, organized special issues, and participated as a technical program committee member for major international conferences. Dr. Tan is currently recruiting PhD students for research projects on network security, adversarial machine learning for anomaly/malware detection, virtualization security, and IoT security.