The Algorithms and Optimization group supervises bachelor and master's theses of students in ETHZ D-INFK, and we supervise student projects through the courses 'Research in Computer Science' and 'Praktische Arbeit'. In some cases, we also supervise master's theses and projects for students in other ETHZ departments.
We give preference to students with an appropriate background, in particular, for bachelor theses, we recommend taking 'Algorithms, Probability, and Computing', and for master's theses, we recommend taking 'Advanced Graph Algorithms and Optimization'.
Most of our projects are theoretical in nature, but we also consider applied projects, usually focused on implementing and evaluating practical algorithms in numerical linear algebra, convex optimization, and various graph problems.
Our projects typically involve topics close the to group's research focuses: Graph algorithms (static and dynamic), convex optimization, numerical linear algebra, random matrix theory and discrepancy theory, and fine-grained complexity. We sometimes supervise students in less directly related areas, but this requires a high degree of independence on the part of the student.
If you are interested, please send an email to supervision-kyng@lists.inf.ethz.ch, including an up-to-date transcript and thoughts on what areas you are interested in. Please indicate in the subject line (1) your name (2) which course category would you like to enroll in (3) when you wish the carry out your project, e.g. "Peter Pan, MS thesis, Fall Semester 2022" or "Hermione Granger, Praktische Arbeit, Spring Semester 2023".
CADMO has additional information on writing a thesis at the Theory Institute, in particular, the information on support, expectations, formalities, and grading applies to our supervision as well, except that we do not generally schedule presentations in the Mittagsseminar, but may sometimes schedule a project presentation with the Algorithms and Optimization group as part of our evaluation.
You may find it interesting to check out our online research seminar, the Algorithms and Complexity Seminar, where (mostly external) speakers give talks on current topics in theoretical computer science.