I’m a PhD student in computer science at MPI-SWS broadly interested in the theory and implementation of programming languages (from logical foundations all the way to the microarchitecture of the targeted hardware).
You can reach me at skehrli[at]mpi-sws[.]org. This is my Github.
¶Education
- PhD in Computer Science from MPI-SWS (ongoing).
- BSc in Computer Science from ETH Zürich (2021-2025).
- Exchange student at the University of Washington (2023-2024).
¶Research
As a research intern at UW, I designed and implemented a type system to prove the absence of resource leaks on collections of resources in Java. This is implemented as a checker in the excellent Java Checker Framework. Advised by Michael Ernst:
As a thesis intern at EPFL, I formalized a first-order arithmetic termed Grounded Arithmetic (based on the Grounded Deduction logic) in the Isabelle/Pure proof assistant. Grounded Arithmetic is interesting, because it permits arbitrary recursion in definitions, allowing even non-terminating or circular definitions as terms in the logic, which means it can express arbitrary computation despite being only a first-order arithmetic. To remain consistent, Grounded Arithmetic weakens many inference rules compared to classical arithmetic. Besides the axiomatization of the logic and the arithmetic theory itself, I formalized a fair bit of basic arithmetic, which culminated in formalizing Cantor tuples and associated machinery in order to embed inductive datatypes into the natural numbers. A case study then provided a fully verified encoded List inductive datatype, with all required theorems proven in Grounded Arithmetic itself. Advised by Bryan Ford:
¶Teaching
- Teaching Assistant in Parallel Programming at ETH. For this one, I authored lecture notes and received the VIS Teaching Award for extraordinary commitment as a TA. Theory recaps and exercise solving for two classes of ~30 students each per week.
- Teaching Assistant in Algorithms & Datastructures at ETH. Theory recaps and exercise solving for a class of ~30 students each per week.