Theory and Foundations

Overview of theme

Research in our Theory and Foundations division is concerned with various topics of Theoretical Computer Science, such as design and analysis of algorithms, complexity theory, logic, automata and formal verification. Our research aims at providing understanding of fundamental problems arising in Computer Science and to design mathematical tools and better algorithms to solve these problems.

Our key research areas include:

algorithmic aspects of game theory and economics
automata and formal languages
sublinear and streaming algorithms
combinatorics, and their applications
logic and games
parallel and distributed algorithms
random structures and randomized algorithms
algorithmic aspects of machine learning and AI

computational complexity
discrete mathematics
graph and network algorithms
online and dynamic algorithms
parameterized complexity and structural graph theory

Publications and Projects

Our Publications list provides details of our published papers in books, journals and conferences.

We are involved in many diverse research projects funded by several external bodies such as UK Research and Innovation, The Royal Society, EPSRC etc.

Theory and Foundations News

Tue 23 Sept '25

Workshop Algorithms & Complexity @ Warwick

Tue 17 Jun '25

Best Paper Award at STOC 2025

Sun 05 Jan '25

Quantum Computing Paper Featured on the Cover of PRX Quantum

Archive news

Theory and Foundations Events

Fri 17 May '24
DIMAP Theory Highlights 2024,
Radcliffe (Space 17),
Event starts at 1pm.

Mon 27 Oct '25

14:00 - 15:00:

DIMAP Seminar: Bruno Pasqualotto Cavalar (University of Oxford)

Tue 04 Nov '25

14:00 - 15:00:

DIMAP Seminar: Yanlin Chen (University of Maryland)

Mon 10 Nov '25

14:00 - 15:00:

DIMAP Seminar: Viresh Patel (Queen Mary, University of London)

DIMAP Theory Highlight 2024

On May the 17th, FoCS & DIMAP held the workshop DIMAP Theory Highlights 2024.

The event was attended by students and staff members of FoCS and DIMAP. The workshop offered an opportunity for the members of the group to get together, interact with each other, and hear about some exciting developments in the research areas of interest to staff in the theory group.

For further information see here.