Hi there! π I am Chang Yu (δΊη ), a Postdoc researcher at the College of Engineering, Westlake University, working with Chair Prof. Stan Z. Li (IEEE Fellow). I received my Ph.D. in 2024 from the National Laboratory of Pattern Recognition (NLPR), Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASIA), advised by Prof. Zhen Lei (IEEE Fellow). Before that, I received my B.E. in Automation from Xiβan Jiaotong University.
My research sits at the intersection of AI for Science and World Model. I focus on uncovering intrinsic structural priors in complex systems β hierarchical composition, the biological Central Dogma, and dynamical priors β and using them to constrain deep representation and generation models, bridging visual perception with biological modeling.
If you are interested, feel free to contact me for future collaborations through Email.
π Research Interests
My work centers on discovering intrinsic structural priors in complex systems and using them to guide deep representation and generation. Current directions:
a) AI for Science
- Cross-omics modeling along the Central Dogma (DNA β RNA β protein)
- Single-cell dynamics and context-aware biological representation
- Structure-based drug design and molecular modality expansion
b) Hierarchical Part-Whole Representation
- Capsule networks for unsupervised part discovery
- 3D face modeling beyond 3DMM
- 2Dβ2.5Dβ3D pathway in neural networks (Marr-inspired)
c) Unified Dynamics on Data Manifolds
- ODE discovery, RNA velocity inference, and AI-generated video detection
- Manifold decoupling for cross-task dynamics modeling
π₯ News
- 2026: β¨β¨β¨ CDBridge (first author) accepted at ICLR 2026.
- 2026: β¨β¨β¨ SYNC (co-corresponding) accepted at ICLR 2026.
- 2026: β¨β¨β¨ SteinsGate (co-corresponding) accepted at ICLR 2026.
- 2026: β¨β¨β¨ VitaMol (co-corresponding) accepted at Pattern Recognition.
- 2026: π Geometric Flow Grounding (first author) in submission at ICML 2026.
- 2025: β¨β¨β¨ DaCapo (co-corresponding) accepted at CVPR 2025.
- 2025: π Started as Postdoc at College of Engineering, Westlake University, working with Prof. Stan Z. Li.
- 2024.06: πππ Obtained Ph.D. degree from CASIA, advised by Prof. Zhen Lei.
- 2023: β¨β¨β¨ Graphics Capsule (first author) accepted at CVPR 2023.
- 2022: β¨β¨β¨ HP-Capsule (first author) accepted at CVPR 2022.
- 2022: β¨β¨β¨ Beyond 3DMM accepted at T-PAMI.
π οΈ Research Projects
Central DogmaβGuided Cross-Omics Learning: From DNA to Cell
Open Project of the State Key Laboratory of Multimodal Artificial Intelligence Systems (MAIS), Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Principal Investigator Β· 2025 β 2026
Deep Transformation of Protein SequenceβStructure Relationships and Protein-Target Drug Design
Ministry of Science and Technology of China, STI2030 Major Project on New-Generation Artificial Intelligence
Core Member Β· 2025 β 2027 Β· Responsible for mid-term report and multi-team coordination
Prompt Mechanism in Latent Diffusion for Text-to-Image Generation
Research Collaboration with Huawei
Research Intern Β· 2022 β 2023 Β· Improving text-to-image accuracy from both quality and semantic perspectives
π Publications
Chang Yu highlighted. † Equal contribution. * Corresponding author.
CDBridge: A Cross-omics Post-training Bridge Strategy for Context-aware Biological Modeling
Chang Yu, Siyuan Li, Zicheng Liu, Jingbo Zhou, Xianglong Guo, Kai Yu, Yuqing Zhou, Ken Li, Zelin Zang, Zhen Lei, Stan Z. Li
Chang Yu, Yuxuan Luo, Yixuan Du, et al.
GraVQ: Fine-Grained Cross-Omics Translation via Group-Advantage Vector Quantization
Chang Yu, Xianglong Guo, Jingjing Jiang, Siyuan Li, Jingbo Zhou, Changxi Chi, Zelin Zang, Zhen Lei, Stan Z. Li
SYNC: Measuring and Advancing Synthesizability in Structure-Based Drug Design
Yunfan Liu, Lirong Wu, Zhifeng Gao, ..., Chang Yu*, Stan Z. Li
VitaMol: Lightweight Molecular Modality Expansion in Discrete Space for Multi-Task Transfer Learning
Yunfan Liu, Zhifeng Gao, Lirong Wu, ..., Chang Yu*, Stan Z. Li
Graphics Capsule: Learning Hierarchical 3D Face Representations from 2D Images
Chang Yu, Xiangyu Zhu, Xiaomei Zhang, Zhaoxiang Zhang, Zhen Lei
HP-Capsule: Unsupervised Face Part Discovery by Hierarchical Parsing Capsule Network
Chang Yu, Xiangyu Zhu, Xiaomei Zhang, Zidu Wang, Zhaoxiang Zhang, Zhen Lei
Out-of-distribution Detection for Reliable Face Recognition
Chang Yu, Xiangyu Zhu, Zhen Lei, Stan Z. Li
Revisiting Marr in Face: A 2D-2.5D-3D Pathway to Part-whole Representation in Neural Networks
Xiangyu Zhu, Chang Yu*, Jiankuo Zhao, Zhaoxiang Zhang, Stan Z. Li, Zhen Lei
Beyond 3DMM: Learning to Capture High-fidelity 3D Face Shape
Xiangyu Zhu, Chang Yu, Di Huang, Zhen Lei, Hao Wang, Stan Z. Li
SteinsGate: Adding Causality to Diffusions for Long Video Generation via Path Integral
Yufei Huang, Liangyu Yuan, ..., Chang Yu*, Stan Z. Li
DaCapo: Score Distillation as Stacked Bridge for Fast and High-quality 3D Editing
Yufei Huang, Bangyan Liao, ..., Chang Yu*, Zhen Lei
π¬ Patents
AI for Science (3 patents pending)
- Siyuan Li, Zicheng Liu, Chang Yu, Lei Xin, Stan Z. Li. An AI-based Method for Integrated Analysis of Multi-Omics Sequence Data.
- Siyuan Li, Lei Xin, Chang Yu, Stan Z. Li. A Method for Integrative Analysis of Multi-Omics Sequence Data.
- Cheng Tan, Zhangyang Gao, Chang Yu, Stan Z. Li. A Protein Structure Representation Method Based on Vector Quantization.
Computer Vision (4 patents granted)
- Xiangyu Zhu, Zhen Lei, Chang Yu. Fine-structure-oriented 3D Face Reconstruction Method, System and Apparatus. ZL202010892658.3
- Zhen Lei, Xiangyu Zhu, Chang Yu. Scene-Adaptive Fine 3D Face Reconstruction Method, System and Electronic Device. ZL202110601213.X
- Zhen Lei, Jianhua Tao, Xiaomei Zhang, Chang Yu. A Capsule-Network-based Facial Expression Recognition Method and Apparatus. ZL202111195200.3
- Xiaomei Zhang, Zhen Lei, Xiangyu Zhu, Chang Yu. Unsupervised Human Body Part Region Determination Method and Apparatus. ZL202311461061.3
π Education
Postdoc, College of Engineering, Westlake University, Hangzhou
Advisor: Prof. Stan Z. Li (IEEE Fellow)
Ph.D. in Computer Application Technology, NLPR, Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASIA), Beijing
Advisor: Prof. Zhen Lei (IEEE Fellow)
B.E. in Automation, School of Electronic and Information Engineering, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an
π Honors and Awards
- 2022 β Pan Deng Scholarship (Second Class), Chinese Academy of Sciences
- 2020 β 2022 β Outstanding Student, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
- 2018 β Meritorious Winner (M Award), Mathematical Contest in Modeling (MCM/ICM)
- 2017 β National Scholarship
π¬ Academic Service
Conference Reviewer
- CVPR
- NeurIPS
- ICML
- ACM Multimedia
- AAAI
Journal Reviewer
- Pattern Recognition