Biography
I am a second-year PhD student in Mathematics at UBC’s Okanagan Campus, supervised by Dr. Warren Hare and Dr. Amy Wiebe. Previously, I finished my MSc in Mathematics at UBC and BSc in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics (Hua Luogeng Mathematics Class) at Beihang University.
My research interests include derivative-free optimization, numerical optimization, and discrete geometry. Also, I’m interested in computer programming and algorithms.
Interests
- Derivative-free Optimization
- Numerical Optimization
- Discrete Geometry
Education
-
PhD in Mathematics, 2028 (expected)
University of British Columbia
-
MSc in Mathematics, 2024
University of British Columbia
-
BSc in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, 2022
Beihang University
Publications
(2025).
CLARSTA: A random subspace trust-region algorithm for convex-constrained derivative-free optimization.
preprint.
(2025).
Determining inscribability of polytopes via rank minimization based on slack matrices.
SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematics, to appear.
(2025).
A general framework for floating point error analysis of first-order simplex derivatives.
Optimization Methods and Software.
(2024).
$Q$-fully quadratic modeling and its application in a random subspace derivative-free method.
Computational Optimization and Applications.
(2023).
Adapting the centred simplex gradient to compensate for misaligned sample points.
IMA Journal of Numerical Analysis.
(2022).
Error Analysis of Surrogate Models Constructed through Operations on Sub-models.
Mathematics of Operations Research.
Recent & Upcoming Talks
Teaching
Graduate Teaching Assistant (University of British Columbia)
- 2026 Spring: MATH/COSC 303 Numerical Analysis
- 2025 Spring: MATH 340 Introduction to Linear Programming
- 2025 Spring: MATH/COSC 303 Numerical Analysis
- 2024 Fall: MATH 461/563 Continuous Optimization
- 2024 Fall: MATH 327 Analysis Ⅰ
- 2024 Fall: MATH 200 Calculus Ⅲ
- 2024 Spring: MATH/COSC 303 Numerical Analysis
- 2024 Spring: MATH 221 Matrix Algebra
- 2023 Fall: MATH 462/562 Derivative-free Optimization
- 2023 Fall: MATH 200 Calculus Ⅲ
- 2023 Spring: MATH 221 Matrix Algebra
- 2022 Fall: MATH 200 Calculus Ⅲ
Honours & Awards
- Killam Doctoral Scholarship, Killam Trusts, 2025-2027
- UBC Okanagan Distinguished Doctoral Scholar Award, UBC, 2024-2028
- Faculty of Science Graduate Entrance Award, UBC, 2024
- International Four-Year Doctoral Partial Tuition Award, UBC, 2024-2028
- Mitacs Globalink Graduate Fellowship, Mitacs, 2022
- Outstanding Bachelor’s Thesis Award, Beihang University, 2022
- Hua Luogeng Scholarship, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 2021
Contact
- yiwchen@student.ubc.ca
- 3333 University Way, Kelowna, BC V1V 1V7, Canada