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117                <center><h2 itemprop="name">Boaz Barak</h2> 
118                (In Hebrew: <span lang=he dir=rtl><b>&#1489;&#1493;&#1506;&#1494; &#1489;&#1512;&#1511;</b></span> ,  <a href="/boaz_pronounce.m4a"><small>how to pronounce</small></a>)</center>
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121                 <h3>Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences</h3>
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182                 <td></td> <td align="left"><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/"><i class="fa fa-blog fa-2x"></i></a> &nbsp; &emsp;  <a href="https://twitter.com/boazbaraktcs"><i class="fab fa-twitter fa-2x"></i></a> &nbsp; &emsp; <a rel="me" href="https://sigmoid.social/@boazbaraktcs"> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 512 512" id="IconChangeColor" height="30" width="30"><path d="M480,173.59c0-104.13-68.26-134.65-68.26-134.65C377.3,23.15,318.2,16.5,256.8,16h-1.51c-61.4.5-120.46,7.15-154.88,22.94,0,0-68.27,30.52-68.27,134.65,0,23.85-.46,52.35.29,82.59C34.91,358,51.11,458.37,145.32,483.29c43.43,11.49,80.73,13.89,110.76,12.24,54.47-3,85-19.42,85-19.42l-1.79-39.5s-38.93,12.27-82.64,10.77c-43.31-1.48-89-4.67-96-57.81a108.44,108.44,0,0,1-1-14.9,558.91,558.91,0,0,0,96.39,12.85c32.95,1.51,63.84-1.93,95.22-5.67,60.18-7.18,112.58-44.24,119.16-78.09C480.84,250.42,480,173.59,480,173.59ZM399.46,307.75h-50V185.38c0-25.8-10.86-38.89-32.58-38.89-24,0-36.06,15.53-36.06,46.24v67H231.16v-67c0-30.71-12-46.24-36.06-46.24-21.72,0-32.58,13.09-32.58,38.89V307.75h-50V181.67q0-38.65,19.75-61.39c13.6-15.15,31.4-22.92,53.51-22.92,25.58,0,44.95,9.82,57.75,29.48L256,147.69l12.45-20.85c12.81-19.66,32.17-29.48,57.75-29.48,22.11,0,39.91,7.77,53.51,22.92Q399.5,143,399.46,181.67Z" id="mainIconPathAttribute" fill="#3399ff"></path></svg> </a>   &nbsp; &emsp;   <a href="https://github.com/boazbk/"><i class="fab fa-github fa-2x"></i></a></td>
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230                 <i class="fa fa-link" aria-hidden="true"></i> <b>Quick Links:</b>
231             </td>
232             <td   style="horizontal-aign:left vertical-align:top">
233                 <p><a href="https://mlfoundations.org">ML Foundations</a>   | <a href="https://boazbk.github.io/mltheoryseminar/">AI Safety</a> |  <a href="https://introtcs.org">Intro TCS</a> | <a href="https://intensecrypto.org">Crypto</a>  |   <a href="https://theory.cs.princeton.edu/complexity/">Complexity</a></p>
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243        <p>I am a professor of Computer Science at Harvard University, as well as a member of the technical staff at OpenAI. Previously,  I was a principal researcher at Microsoft Research New England, and before that I was an associate professor (with tenure) at Princeton University&rsquo;s Computer Science department. I hold a Ph.D from the Weizmann Institute of Science, and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.</p>
244
245<p><font color="#A41034"><strong>Starting in the Fall of 2025 I will be part time at Harvard as a Catalyst Professor and part time at OpenAI.</strong></font></p>
246
247<p>I am a theoretical computer scientist, and have worked on computational complexity, algorithms, cryptography, quantum computing. In recent years my focus has been on<a href="https://mlfoundations.org">foundations of machine learning</a> and safety of artificial intelligence systems.</p>
248
249<p><p>See also my <a href="cv.pdf"><b>curriculum vitae</b></a> and <a href="Bio/"><b>brief bio</b></a>.
250I also occasionally <a href="https://windowsontheory.org/">blog</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/boazbaraktcs">tweet</a>.</p>
251
252<p><strong>Current activities:</strong>  I am a co organizer of the <a href="https://mlfoundations.org">Harvard Machine Learning Foundations seminar</a> and a steering committee member and associate faculty of the <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/kempner-institute/">Kempner Institute for the Study of Natural and Artificial Intelligence</a>. Board member and co organizer of <a href="https://www.addiscoder.com/">Addis Coder</a> as well as <a href="https://jamcoders.org.jm/">Jam Coders</a>. See my <a href="cv.pdf"><b>CV</b></a> for past activities.</p>
253
254<p><strong>Past activities:</strong> I previously served on the editorial boards of the <a href="https://theoryofcomputing.org/">
254Theory of Computing Journal</a> (ToC) and the <a href="https://eccc.hpi-web.de/">Electronic Colloquium of Computational Complexity</a>, and on the scientific advisory boards of the wonderful <a href="https://quantamagazine.org/">Quanta Magazine</a> and the <a href="https://simons.berkeley.edu/">Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing</a>.</p>
255
256<p><strong>Current students:</strong>  <a href="https://gahdritz.github.io/">Gustaf Ahdritz</a>, <a href="https://depenm.github.io/">Depen Morwani</a>, <a href="https://rosieyzh.github.io/">Rosie Zhao</a>, <a href="https://natalieabreu.github.io/website/">Natalie Abreu</a></p>
257
258<p><strong>Former students:</strong> <a href="https://syq2012.github.io/">Yueqi Sheng</a>, <a href="https://www.cs.bu.edu/~goldbe/">Sharon Goldberg</a>
259(co advised with <a href="https://www.cs.princeton.edu/%7Ejrex/">Jennifer Rexford</a>), <a href="https://www.irif.fr/~dxiao/">David Xiao</a> (co advised with <a href="https://www.math.ias.edu/%7Eavi/">Avi Wigderson</a>),
260<a href="https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~mohammad/">Mohammad Mahmoody</a>,
261<a href="https://mrtz.org/">Moritz Hardt</a>,
262Zhixian Lei,
263<a href="https://preetum.nakkiran.org/">Preetum Nakkiran</a> (co-advised with Madhu Sudan), <a href="https://yaminibansal.com/">Yamini Bansal</a> (co-advised with David Cox),
264<a href="https://cnchou.github.io/">Chi-Ning Chou</a>,
265<a href="https://vprayaag.github.io/">Prayaag Venkat</a>, <a href="https://www.galkaplun.com/">Gal Kaplun</a>.</p>
266
267<p><strong>Current postdocs:</strong> <a href="https://nikhilvyas.github.io/">Nikhil Vyas</a>, <a href="https://sjelassi.github.io/">Samy Jelassi</a>. I also work closely with <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/kempner-institute/2023/05/11/announcing-2023-kempner-institute-research-fellows/">Kempner Institute research fellows</a></p>
268
269<p><strong>Former postdocs:</strong> <a href="https://www.eng.tau.ac.il/~bennyap/">Benny
270Applebaum</a>, <a href="https://www.complexity.ethz.ch/people/holthoma">Thomas
271Holenstein</a>, <a href="https://research.microsoft.com/en-us/people/guyroth/">Guy
272Rothblum</a>, <a href="https://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~tschramm/">Tselil Schramm</a>.</p>
273
274<p><strong>Former interns:</strong> <a href="https://mrtz.org/">Moritz Hardt</a>, <a href="https://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~jsherman/">Jonah Sherman</a>, <a href="https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~yuanzhou/">Yuan Zhou</a>,  <A href="https://www.cs.columbia.edu/~liyang/">Li-Yang Tan</a> , Aaron Sidford, Aaron Potechin, <a href="https://www.cs.utexas.edu/~kothari/">Pravesh Kothari</a>, <a href="https://www.samuelbhopkins.com/">Sam Hopkins</a>.</p>
275
276<p><strong>Funding:</strong> I am currently supported by a Simons Investigator Fellowship, the Kempner Institute, NSF grant DMS-2134157, DARPA grant W911NF2010021,and DOE grant DE-SC0022199. I am also grateful for support from Oracle Labs and past support by the NSF, as well as the Packard and Sloan foundations and the BSF.</p>
277
278<p><strong>Want to work with me?</strong> At the moment I am not looking for students or postdocs to advise on my own, though am open to potentially co advising. I am interested in <a href="https://mlfoundations.org/">machine learning foundations</a>. In particular see the opportunities sections of the <a href="https://mlfoundations.org/#opportunities">ML foundations</a> and the <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/kempner-institute/opportunities/">Kempner Institute</a> websites. You can see this page for how to apply for <a href="https://gsas.harvard.edu/programs-of-study/all/computer-science">graduate studies in computer science</a>; we also have a new <a href="https://gsas.harvard.edu/programs-of-study/all/quantum-science-and-engineering">Quantum Science and Engineering program</a>. Please do not email me with your resume - if you are interested in working with me, you can indicate this on your application and it will get to me. We also have some <strong>postdoc positions</strong> in both the foundations of Machine Learning and  theoretical CS. I typically announce any such positions on my <a href="https://windowsontheory.org/">blog</a> or <a href="https://twitter.com/boazbaraktcs">Twitter</a>, and post TCS positions on the <a href="https://cstheory-jobs.org/">TCS jobs</a>  page.  <a rel="me" href="https://twitter.com/boazbaraktcs">.</a><a rel="me" href="https://sigmoid.social/@boazbaraktcs">.</a><a rel="me" href="https://mastodon.online/@boazbaraktcs">.</a></p>
279
280<p><em>Personal:</em> I am married to <a href="https://riseptma.com">Ravit Barak</a>.</p>
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295</section>
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302<section id="news"
303    class="home-section">
304    <div class="container">
305        <div class="row">
306            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-4">
307                <h1>
308                    <font color="#990000">News</font>
309                </h1>
310            </div>
311            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-8">
312                <ul>
313<li><p>From Fall 2025 I will be both at Harvard and at OpenAI.</p></li>
314
315<li><p>I am teaching <a href="https://boazbk.github.io/mltheoryseminar/">AI safety</a> in Fall 2025.</p></li>
316
317<li><p>See the <a href="https://mlfoundations.org">Harvard ML foundations group website</a> for our seminar and other activities in the foundations of machine learning. In particular the <strong>opportunities</strong> section there contains information about positions for undergraduate students, graduate students, postdocs, and faculty.</p></li>
318</ul>
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320            </div>
321        </div>
322    </div>
323</section>
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329<section id="publications" class="home-section">
330    <div class="container">
331        <div class="row">
332            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-4">
333                <h1>Selected Publications</h1>
334                <p><a href="/Papers/">All publications <i class="fa fa-angle-double-right" style="padding-left: 5px;"></i></a></p>
335            </div>
336            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-8">
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356             Below are some of my papers, <a href="Papers/">click here</a> to see all my publications:
357             <p>
358             <p>
359                 <div id="selected_publications"></div>
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363            </div>
364        </div>
365    </div>
366</section>
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370<section id="writing"
371    class="home-section">
372    <div class="container">
373        <div class="row">
374            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-4">
375                <h1>Writing</h1>
376                <p><a href="/informal">All Writing <i class="fa fa-angle-double-right" style="padding-left: 5px;"></i></a></p> 
377            </div>
378            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-8">
379                <p><p>I wrote a graduate textbook with Sanjeev Arora:  <a href="https://www.cs.princeton.edu/theory/complexity/">Computational
380Complexity: A Modern Approach</a>. I am currently writing an undergraduate textbook: <a href="https://introtcs.org">Introduction to Theoretical Computer Science</a>. I also wrote extensive notes on  <a href="https://intensecrypto">an intense introduction to cryptography</a> and on the <a href="https://sumofsquares.org">sum of squares algorithm</a> (with David Steurer). I occasionally blog on the <a href="https://windowsontheory.org">Windows on Theory blog</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/boazbaraktcs">Tweet</a>.</p>
381
382<p>Some surveys and essays I wrote are below. See <a href="/informal/">here</a> for more of my less technical writing.</p>
383
384<ul>
385<li><p>Some blog posts on AI and AI safety (see more <a href="https://windowsontheory.org/category/philosophizing/">here</a> ):</p>
386
387<ul>
388<li><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2025/01/24/six-thoughts-on-ai-safety/">Six thoughts on AI Safety</a></li>
389<li><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2022/11/22/ai-will-change-the-world-but-wont-take-it-over-by-playing-3-dimensional-chess/">AI will change the world, but won’t take it over by playing “3-dimensional chess”</a>
390<br /></li>
391</ul></li>
392
393<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2022/06/20/the-uneasy-relationship-between-deep-learning-and-classical-statistics/">The uneasy relationship between deep learning and statistics</a>  - blog post. See also my <a href="https://boazbk.github.io/mltheoryseminar/">deep learning foundations seminar</a>.</p></li>
394
395<li><p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41567-020-01126-7">Work with what you&rsquo;ve got</a>, Nature Physics, January 21. (About experiments running the QAOA algorithm on near-term intermediate-scale noisy quantum devices (NISQ).</p></li>
396
397<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2017/10/30/the-different-forms-of-quantum-computing-skepticism/">The different forms of quantum computing skepticism</a> - blog post. See also <a href="https://www.boazbarak.org/Papers/skeptics.pdf">pdf version</a></p></li>
398
399<li><p><a href="https://eccc.weizmann.ac.il/report/2017/065/">The Complexity of Public-Key Cryptography</a> - survey/tutorial on the computational assumptions landscape of cryptogrpahy. Written in honor of Oded Goldreich&rsquo;s 60th birthday.</p></li>
400
401<li><p><a href="https://www.boazbarak.org/Papers/bayesian.pdf">Bayesianism, frequentism, and the planted clique, or do algorithms believe in unicorns?</a>, April 2016. See also <a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2016/04/13/bayesianism-frequentism-and-the-planted-clique-or-do-algorithms-believe-in-unicorns/">blog post</a> on windows of theory blog and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc-ZozzaJ2Y&amp;list=PLYbY2kg6Mm3O0u1uck3NEa_mz_oaRgJXs&amp;index=2">video of a talk at Northwestern</a>.</p></li>
402
403<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2017/08/16/men-in-computer-science/">Men in Computer Science</a> - blog post, August 2017.</p></li>
404
405<li><p><a href="https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2016/3/198855-hopes-fears-and-software-obfuscation/fulltext">Hopes, Fears, and Software Obfuscation</a>, Communications of the ACM, March 2016. See also <a href="Papers/obfuscation-preprint.pdf">preprint version</a> and <a href="https://vimeo.com/154339241">video of short interview</a>.</p></li>
406
407<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2016/02/07/speaking-about-unspeakables/">Speaking about  unspeakables</a>, Harvard <a href="https://ltl2016.com/">Lectures that Last 2016</a>, February 2016, see also <a href="https://youtu.be/ZBFowd7-Vrs">video of lecture</a>.</p></li>
408
409<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2013/10/07/structure-vs-combinatorics-in-computational-complexity/">Structure vs Combinatorics in Computational Complexity</a>, Windows on Theory blog, October 2013.  See also <a href="https://eccc.hpi-web.de/report/2013/182/f">adapted version</a> in the bulletin of the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science.</p></li>
410
411<li><p><a href="https://windowsontheory.org/2012/07/31/truth-vs-proof-the-unique-games-conjecture-and-feiges-hypothesis/">Truth vs. Proof - the Unique Games Conjecture and Feige&rsquo;s Hypothesis</a>, Windows on Theory blog, July 2012.  See also <a href="https://www.boazbarak.org/Papers/truth-proof.pdf">adapted version</a>  in logic in computer science column of the bulletin of the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science.</p></li>
412
413<li><p>My first publication: <a href="/commodore1988.png">tip for Ultima IV game</a>
413 in <a href="https://archive.org/details/18-commodore-magazine">Commodore Magazine</a>, June 1988.</p></li>
414</ul>
415
416            </div>
417        </div>
418    </div>
419</section>
420
421
422
423
424<section id="teaching" class="home-section">
425    <div class="container">
426        <div class="row">
427            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-4">
428                <h1>Teaching</h1>
429                <p><a href="/Courses">All teaching <i class="fa fa-angle-double-right"
430                            style="padding-left: 5px;"></i></a></p>
431            </div>
432            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-8">
433                <p>Here are some of the courses / lectures I (Co) taught (see <a href="Courses/">here</a> for all courses):</p>
434
435<ul>
436<li><p><a href="https://boazbk.github.io/mltheoryseminar/">Harvard CS 2881: AI Safety</a>, Fall 2025</p></li>
437
438<li><p><a href="https://boazbk.github.io/mltheoryseminar/">Harvard CS229br: Foundations of Deep Learning</a>, Spring 2021, Spring 2023</p></li>
439
440<li><p><a href="https://cs121.boazbarak.org">Harvard CS121: Introduction to Theoretical Computer Science</a> - Fall 2019, Fall 2018, Fall 2017, Fall 2022.</p></li>
441
442<li><p><a href="https://cs127.boazbarak.org">Harvard CS127: Cryptography</a>, Fall 2021, Spring 2020, Spring 2018, Spring 2016.</p></li>
443
444<li><p><a href="/fall18seminar">Harvard CS229r: Physics and Computation Seminar</a>, Fall 2018.</p></li>
445
446<li><p><a href="https://www.boazbarak.org/sos/">Harvard CS229r / MIT 6.S898: Proofs, beliefs and algorithms through the lens of Sum of Squares</a> - Fall 2016 - graduate course/seminar on the Sum of Squares algorithm.</p></li>
447
448<li><p><a href="https://addiscoder.com/">Addis Coder</a> -summer course on algorithms and coding for high school students in Ethiopia. See also <a href="https://jamcoders.org.jm/">Jam Coders</a> - a version of this course in Jamaica.</p></li>
449
450<li><p><a href="https://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/spring09/cos522/">Princeton COS 522 - (graduate) Computational Complexity</a> - Spring 2009</p></li>
451
452<li><p><a href="https://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/spring08/cos598D/">Princeton COS 598D - Mathematical Methods in Theoretical Computer Science</a> - Spring 2008</p></li>
453</ul>
454
455            </div>
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458</section>
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467<section id="contact" class="home-section">
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470            <div class="col-xs-12 col-md-4">
471                <h1>Contact</h1>
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520    or
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530     for reference letter or manuscript review requests respectively. <small><font color="gray">(emails to these addresses are forwarded to my main inbox, but are also tagged appropriately so I don't lose track of them. Emails to the reference address are also forwarded to my faculty coordinator.)</font></small>
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555     <b>Physical Location:</b> Office 3.309 in <a href="https://www.seas.harvard.edu/about-us/visit-us/allston/science-engineering-complex">Harvard Allston SEC
556    complex</a>, 150 Western Avenue, Boston, MA.
557     </td>
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561
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564         <i class="fa fa-gift fa-fw fa-4x" aria-hidden="true"></i>
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567    <b>Mailing Address:</b> Professor Boaz Barak, Harvard University SEAS, SEC Building Office 3.309, 150 Western Avenue, Boston, MA 02134
568     </td>
569 </tr>
570 <tr>
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572        <i class="fa fa-user fa-fw fa-4x" aria-hidden="true"></i>
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575         <b>Administrative assistant:</b> Kristin Maple , <a href="[email protected]">[email protected]</a>
576     </td>
577 </tr>
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579     <td>
580        <i class="fa fa-phone fa-fw fa-4x" aria-hidden="true"></i>
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583         <b>Phone:</b> (617) 496-1004  <small><font color="gray">(I prefer email)</font></small>
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