Hey, I am Neel, a CS PhD student in the USC Theory Group, where I am very lucky to be advised by Shaddin Dughmi and David Kempe. I was very fortunate to work as a Research Intern at Google Research Mountain View during the Summer of 2024 hosted by Kshipra Bhawalkar in the Market Algorithm’s Team. Currently, I am a part-time Student Researcher at Google Research.
I am broadly interested in Combinatorial Optimization in the presence of Uncertainty or Incentives, Algorithmic Contract Theory and Computational Economics. Recently, I have been also working on problems in designing (fast) Dynamic Algorithms for Graph Problems. I am also interested in designing AI/ML algorithms with the consideration of ethical aspects.
Before starting my Ph.D., I spent wonderful one and a half years at the National University of Singapore as a Research Assistant working with Yair Zick and Reza Shokri. Before that, I completed my B.Stat at Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata.
You can find my updated CV here
Publications
(11) Near-Optimal (1 + ε)-Approximate Fully-Dynamic All-Pairs Shortest Paths in Planar Graphs [Conf. version] [(Full version upon request)]
Arnold Filtser, Gramoz Goranci, Neel Patel and Maximilian Probst Gutenberg
Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS 2024)
(10) Limitations of Stochastic Selection Problems with Pairwise Independent Priors [Paper]
Shaddin Dughmi, Yusuf Kalyaci and Neel Patel
Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC 2024)
(9) On Supermodular Contracts and Dense Subgraphs [Paper]
Shaddin Dughmi, Neel Patel, Aditya Prasad and Ram Deo-Campo Vuong
Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA 2024)
(8) Combinatorial Stationary Prophet Inequalities [Paper]
Neel Patel, and David Wajc
Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA 2024)
(7) Sparsification of Stochastic Packing Problem [Paper]
Shaddin Dughmi, Yusuf Kalyaci and Neel Patel
International Colloquium on Automata Languages and Programming (ICALP 2023)
(6) Delegated Pandora’s Box [Paper] [Talk]
Curtis Bechtel, Shaddin Dughmi and Neel Patel
ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC 2022)
(5) Model Explanations with Differential Privacy [Paper]
Neel Patel, Reza Shokri and Yair Zick
ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT 2022)
(4) High Dimensional Explanation for Black-Box Models: Axiomatic Approach [Paper]
Neel Patel, Martin Strobel and Yair Zick
ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT 2021)
(3) The Price is (Probably) Right: Learning Market Equilibria From Samples [Paper]
Omer Lev, Neel Patel, Vignesh Viswanathan and Yair Zick
International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS 2021)
(2) Discrete Richman-bidding scoring games [Paper]
Urban Larsson, Neel Patel, Ravi Kant Rai
International Journal of Game Theory 1-34
(1) Keeping Your Friends Close: Land Allocation with Friends [Paper]
Edith Elkind, Neel Patel, Alan Tsang and Yair Zick
International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI 2020)
*Author list is alphabetical unless mentioned.
Teaching
- Teaching Assistant for CSCI 675, Convex and Combinatorial Optimization (Fall 2023)
- Teaching Assistant for CSCI 170, Discrete Methods in Computer Science (Summer 2023)
- Teaching Assistant for CSCI 270, CS270, Introduction to Algorithms and the Theory of Computing (Fall 2022)
- Teaching Assistant for CSCI 270, CS270, Introduction to Algorithms and the Theory of Computing (Fall 2021)
Mentoring
- Aditya Prasad (Undergraduate Student at USC CS)
- Ram Deo-Campo Vuong (Undergraduate Student at USC CS)