About Me

Thank you for visiting! I’m Ngoc-Hai (*), a first-year Ph.D. student at Tufts University (US), under the supervision of Professor Shuchin Aeron. Previously, I was a Research Resident at VinAI Research (Vietnam), advised by Dr. Tung Pham. Before that, I earned my B.Sc. in Mathematics (Talented Program) from the University of Science, Vietnam National University – Hanoi (VNU-HUS), where I was advised by Dr. Nguyen Trong Hieu. My long-term research goal is to establish a solid mathematical foundation for problems in statistics and optimization.

Outside of academics, I am passionate about football, with Liverpool FC as my favorite team. In my free time, I enjoy traveling and exploring different cuisines.

*(In Vietnamese, my name symbolizes the “pearl of the sea”).

My Academic Activities

My Research "Career" Until Now

News

Our paper, “An Optimal Transport-driven Approach for Cultivating Latent Space in Online Incremental Learning,” has recently been accepted to CVPR 2026. I'd be in Denver, Colorado, from June 3–7, 2026, and I’d love to connect if we have a chance to meet.

Our paper, “On Barycenter Computation: Analyzing Semi-Unbalanced Optimal Transport-based Method on the Bures–Wasserstein Manifold,” has recently been accepted to AISTATS 2026. I'd be in Tangier, Morocco, from May 2–5, 2026, and I’d love to connect if we have a chance to meet.

Education & Professional Work

I am fortunate to have met great teachers, inspiring mentors, and exceptional colleagues and friends whose support and encouragement have fueled my passion for research and guided me toward achieving my dream.

  • High School for Gifted Students – Specialized Mathematics class; Aug 2016 – May 2019
  • Vietnam National University – University of Science (VNU-HUS) – Bachelor of Science in Mathematics (Talented Program); Aug 2019 – May 2023
  • Vietnam Institute of Mathematics (VAST) – Research Intern; Dec 2021 – Aug 2022
  • VinAI Research (Acquired by Qualcomm AI in Apr 2025) - Research Resident; Aug 2022 – Aug 2025
  • Web IR and NLP Group (WING – NUS) – Research Intern; Jan 2025 – Present
  • Tufts University – Ph.D. Student in Machine Learning (ECE Department); Starting Sep 2025
Project Education

My Publications

I am the author of some publications, listed in chronological order.

  • Ngoc-Hai Nguyen, Dung Le*, Hoang-Phi Nguyen, Tung Pham, Nhat Ho “On Barycenter Computation: Analyzing Semi-Unbalanced Optimal Transport-based Method on Bures-Wasserstein manifold.” Twenty-Ninth Annual Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Statistics (2026). (*equal contribution)
  • Do Xuan Long, Ngoc-Hai Nguyen, Tiviatis Sim, Hieu Dao, Shafiq Joty, Kenji Kawaguchi, Nancy F. Chen, Min-Yen Kan “LLMs Are Biased Towards Output Formats! Systematically Evaluating and Mitigating Output Format Bias of LLMs”. 2025 Annual Conference of the Nations of the Americas Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics
  • Do Xuan Long, Duy Dinh, Ngoc-Hai Nguyen, Kenji Kawaguchi, Nancy F. Chen, Shafiq Joty, Min-Yen Kan “What Makes a Good Natural Language Prompt?”. The 63rd Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (2025)
  • Quyen Tran, ,Ngoc-Hai Nguyen, Quan Dao, Hoang Phan, Linh Ngo Van, Khoat Than, Dimitris N. Metaxas, Dinh Phung, Trung Le “An Optimal Transport-driven Approach for Cultivating Latent Space in Online Incremental Learning”. Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (2026)
Visit My Google Scholar → Scholar
Or My Semantic Scholar → Scholar

Ongoing Project

I am open to opportunities for collaboration and new research ideas. If you are interested in working with me, please feel free to contact via my email. My ongoing research concentrates on these primary (but not limited) areas:

  • Optimal Transport, Optimization and Representation Learning:
  • Large Language Models:
  • Modeling-based Methodology:

We are finalizing and submitting these works:

  • Nguyen Trong Hieu, Ngoc-Hai Nguyen, Le Ba Ngoc “Supporting Diabetes Management: A Mathematical Model-based Framework for Personalized Treatment and Control Strategy Optimization”

My "Business"

Aside from my main research work, I have a non-profit organization called Hanoi Mathematical Modelling, which promotes the study and research of mathematical modelling among high school and undergraduate students through activities such as competitions, seminars, and summer camps. Our goal is to build a big, very big community of students across Vietnam.

Visit Our Fanpage → Facebook
Project tmh

My Beloved People

If there is one reason that drives me to complete my PhD swiftly, it is unquestionably my family.

Family
Me and Dad
Family
Mom and Dad

I grew up in a happy family, surrounded by the love of my parents and the support of wonderful friends throughout my childhood and adolescence. They shaped my character and became the most important parts of my life. Many of those memories I cherish privately in my heart. But there is one other connection I choose to share — because sometimes, making it known is the way to keep it alive.

Princess
Full-time she's a princess…
Baby princess
…and part-time she’s a baby princess

I also have couple of lovely pets

Racun
Easy Racun
Chopy
Silly Chopy
Bao Bao
and Bao Bao . Now he rests at a better place.