UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS CHICAGO

About Me.

Hi! I’m Zhixiang Shen, a Ph.D. student in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Chicago, advised by Prof. Philip S. Yu.

My research interests include AI agents, large language models, and graph foundation models. I am interested in learning systems that reason over structured information and interact with complex environments. My previous work explores graph structure learning, heterogeneous graphs, and multi-domain graph learning.

I received my B.Eng. in Computer Science from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (UESTC, 2021–2025), where I worked closely with Prof. Zhao Kang.

AI AgentsLarge Language ModelsGraph Foundation ModelsGraph Structure Learning

News

Recent updates

I started my Ph.D. in Computer Science at UIC, advised by Prof. Philip S. Yu.

Multi-Domain Graph Foundation Models was accepted to ICML 2025.

Beyond Redundancy (InfoMGF) was accepted to NeurIPS 2024.

Selected Publications4

Google Scholar

Zhixiang Shen is highlighted. * Equal contribution.

ICML 2025 MDGFM framework: multi-domain pre-training with topology alignment and target-domain adaptation MDGFMGraph foundation models

Multi-Domain Graph Foundation Models: Robust Knowledge Transfer via Topology Alignment

Shuo Wang*, Bokui Wang*, Zhixiang Shen*, Boyan Deng, Zhao Kang

International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML), 2025

PMLR 267 · pp. 64806–64821

Aligning graph topologies for robust knowledge transfer across domains.

Research summary

MDGFM combines feature alignment, adaptive weighting of attributes and topology, and graph refinement during self-supervised pre-training. A dual-prompt adaptation stage transfers the resulting representations to unseen domains with few labels. The work studies both transfer performance and resilience to unreliable graph connections.

IEEE TNNLS 2025 LatGRL framework: latent graph construction, dual-frequency filtering, and unsupervised representation learning LatGRLHeterogeneous graphs

When Heterophily Meets Heterogeneous Graphs: Latent Graphs Guided Unsupervised Representation Learning

Zhixiang Shen, Zhao Kang

IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems (TNNLS), 2025

Vol. 36, no. 6 · pp. 10283–10296 · DOI: 10.1109/TNNLS.2025.3540063

Learning from both homophilic and heterophilic patterns in heterogeneous graphs.

Research summary

LatGRL examines semantic heterophily in heterogeneous graphs. It mines latent graphs using structural and attribute similarities, then combines low- and high-frequency information to adapt to individual nodes. The framework learns without labels and includes a scalable implementation for larger graphs.

NeurIPS 2024 InfoMGF framework: graph refinement and fusion that retain shared and view-specific information InfoMGFGraph structure learning

Beyond Redundancy: Information-aware Unsupervised Multiplex Graph Structure Learning

Zhixiang Shen*, Shuo Wang*, Zhao Kang

Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), 2024

Volume 37 · pp. 31629–31658 · Main Conference Track

Preserving shared and view-unique information while removing graph noise.

Research summary

InfoMGF studies multiplex graphs whose different views contain useful information beyond their common signal. It learns refined graph structures and a fused graph, balancing shared and view-specific information while reducing irrelevant connections. The work evaluates the learned graph through downstream tasks and robustness experiments.

ACM MM 2024 BMGC framework: unsupervised dominant-view mining and dual-signal representation learning for clustering BMGCMulti-relational clustering

Balanced Multi-Relational Graph Clustering

Zhixiang Shen, Haolan He, Zhao Kang

ACM International Conference on Multimedia (ACM MM), 2024

32nd ACM Multimedia · pp. 4120–4128 · DOI: 10.1145/3664647.3681325

Discovering the dominant view to address imbalance in multi-relational graphs.

Research summary

BMGC addresses unequal view quality in multi-relational graph clustering. An unsupervised procedure identifies a dominant view during training, and two complementary signals guide representation learning. A graph-quality metric connects structural differences to clustering behavior, with analysis on real and synthetic graphs.

Education

University of Illinois Chicago

Ph.D. in Computer Science

Advisor: Prof. Philip S. Yu

University of Electronic Science and Technology of China

B.Eng. in Computer Science

Research with Prof. Zhao Kang

2021 – 2025

Academic Service

Conference Reviewer

  • NeurIPS2025, 2026
  • ICLR2026, 2027
  • IJCAI2025
  • ACM Multimedia2025

Journal Reviewer

  • IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence (TPAMI)
  • IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems (TNNLS)
  • IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology (TCSVT)

Research figure

BibTeX citation