CV
Education
- Ph.D. in Operations Research, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024–Present
- H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISyE)
- B.S. in Applied Mathematics (Honors, Concentration in Statistics) and B.A. in Computer Science, Bucknell University, 2020–2024
- Graduated Summa Cum Laude
Research experience
- Graduate Researcher, Georgia Institute of Technology — ISyE (2024–Present)
- OPTAgent: LLM-driven synthesis of solver-selection and configuration policies under shared compute budgets (co-first author, NeurIPS 2026 ML×OR Workshop)
- End-to-end supply chain planning in the paper industry via column generation and Benders decomposition (arXiv:2607.16618)
- Proxy Benders Decomposition: replacing Benders subproblem optimization with certified optimization proxies that generate provably valid cuts (arXiv:2606.07403)
- Learning optimization proxies for sequential contextual stochastic programs (arXiv:2606.25362)
- Pareto-regret bounds for stochastic (arXiv:2604.07096) and adversarial (arXiv:2609.23092) multi-objective multi-armed bandits
- Deep learning-driven contextual stochastic optimization for real-time order fulfillment (NeurIPS 2025 ML×OR Workshop)
- Honors Thesis, Bucknell University (2024)
- The Precedence-Constrained Quadratic Knapsack Problem — developed exact and approximate solution methods, experimented with heuristics and metaheuristics, and generated difficult benchmark instances for this previously unstudied NP-hard problem
- Advisor: Dr. Lucas Waddell
- Undergraduate Researcher, Bucknell University — Structure of Optimal Covering Arrays (2022–2024)
- Studied optimization of combinatorial interaction testing with binary parameters and constraints; worked on proofs about the structure of optimal solutions and implemented models in Gurobi and algorithms in Python
- Proposed and received funding from Bucknell’s Program for Undergraduate Research
- Principal Investigator: Dr. Thiago Serra
- Culminated in Optimal Combinatorial Testing with Constraints: The Balancing Act (arXiv:2607.17083, 2026)
- Undergraduate Researcher, Bucknell University — Crouzeix’s Conjecture (2022)
- Co-authored a geometric analysis establishing the level set Crouzeix conjecture for classes of nilpotent matrices, published in Concrete Operators (2024); presented at the Joint Mathematics Meetings 2023 in Boston
- Developed a Mathematica tool for fast visualization of numerical ranges
- Principal Investigator: Dr. Kelly Bickel
Awards & honors
- The Pi Mu Epsilon Society Prize, Bucknell University, 2024 — awarded to the member of the graduating class with the most outstanding work in mathematics
- INFORMS Undergraduate Scholarship, INFORMS, 2023
- Mathematics Scholarship, Bucknell University, 2020–2024
- The Professor George Morris Philips Prize, Bucknell University, 2020 — outstanding academic performance in mathematics
- Dean’s List, Bucknell University — all semesters
- Honor societies: Pi Mu Epsilon (mathematics, 2023), Omega Rho (operations research, 2023), Tri-Alpha (first-generation students, 2023)
Skills
- Optimization: integer programming, combinatorial optimization, stochastic optimization, Gurobi
- Programming: Python, R, Java, Mathematica
- Machine learning: deep learning for decision making, learning-to-optimize
- Languages: English, Mandarin Chinese
Publications
Hanyang Jiang*, Changkun Guan*, Miao Li*, Danlin Li, Sikai Cheng, Pascal Van Hentenryck, Russell Bent. "OPTAgent: From Standalone Solvers to Deployment-Aware Solver Ecosystems." NeurIPS 2026 Second Workshop on ML×OR: Mathematical Foundations and Operational Integration of Machine Learning for Uncertainty-Aware Decision-Making, 2026. (*Equal contribution)
Miao Li, Hanyang Jiang, Hengyu Fu, Baihe Huang, Yating Liu, Yuhang Cai, Changkun Guan, Zhongzhu Chen, Jiecheng Lu, Michael A. Boateng, Pascal Van Hentenryck. "Match the Canvas, Not Just the Answer: Predictability-Aware SFT for Diffusion Language Models." arXiv preprint arXiv:2610.18001, 2026.
Changkun Guan, Mengfan Xu. "The Role of Coordinates in Pareto Regret for Adversarial Multi-Objective Bandits." arXiv preprint arXiv:2609.23092, 2026.
Thiago Serra, Changkun Guan, Hunter Gehman, Sumit Dhar, Mikey Ferguson, John Hooker, Marcel Schoppers. "Optimal Combinatorial Testing with Constraints: The Balancing Act." arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.17083, 2026.
Changkun Guan, Amira Hijazi, Pascal Van Hentenryck. "End-to-End Supply Chain Planning in the Paper Industry Via Column Generation and Benders Decomposition." arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.16618, 2026.
Tinghan Ye, Shuaicheng Tong, Changkun Guan, Beste Basciftci, Pascal Van Hentenryck. "Learning Optimization Proxies for Sequential Contextual Stochastic Programs: An Order Fulfillment Application." arXiv preprint arXiv:2606.25362, 2026.
Changkun Guan, El Mehdi Er Raqabi, Mathieu Tanneau, Pascal Van Hentenryck. "The Proxy Benders Decomposition." arXiv preprint arXiv:2606.07403, 2026.
Changkun Guan, Mengfan Xu. "Are Stochastic Multi-objective Bandits Harder than Single-objective Bandits?" arXiv preprint arXiv:2604.07096, 2026.
Xiangyi Li, Yimin Liu, Wenbo Chen, et al. (incl. Changkun Guan). "SkillsBench: Benchmarking How Well Agent Skills Work Across Diverse Tasks." arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.12670, 2026.
Tinghan Ye, Shuaicheng Tong, Changkun Guan, Beste Basciftci, Pascal Van Hentenryck. "Deep Learning-Driven Contextual Stochastic Optimization for Real-Time Order Fulfillment." NeurIPS 2025 Workshop on ML×OR: Mathematical Foundations and Operational Integration of Machine Learning for Uncertainty-Aware Decision-Making, 2025.
Kelly Bickel, Georgia Corbett, Annie Glenning, Changkun Guan, Martin Vollmayr-Lee. "Crouzeix's conjecture, compressions of shifts, and classes of nilpotent matrices." Concrete Operators, 2024.
Changkun Guan. "The Precedence-Constrained Quadratic Knapsack Problem." Honors Thesis, Bucknell University, 2024. Advisor: Lucas Waddell.
Talks
January 05, 2023
Talk at Joint Mathematics Meetings (JMM) 2023, Boston, MA
Teaching
Grading, Bucknell University, Department of Mathematics & Statistics, 2022–2024
Peer instruction, Bucknell University, Teaching & Learning Center, 2022–2024
A PDF version of my CV is available here.
