Welcome to COLA Laboratory #
Computational Optimization for Learning and Adaptive Systems (COLA) laboratory has contributed the fundamental development of computational/artificial intelligence (CI/AI) for black-box optimization and decision-making (especially with multiple conflicting objectives), as well as applications in life sciences (including bioscience and healthcare) and software engineering. In particular, we have been enthusiastic about broad AI+X (integrating AI with application domains denoted by “X” to enhance, innovate, or transform the domain).
We are constantly looking for talented and passionate people to join our lab. Please refer to vacancies for potential opportunities.
Recent News (Year 2025) #
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Our paper on AI co-scientist has been accepted to Molecular Plant (Cell sub-journal). This is a collaboration with Yiliang’s group at the John Innes Centre, The Sainsbury Laboratory, and Huakun’s group at the Northeast Agricultural University. It is a live AI agent where you can register and try through here. Congratulations to Shasha and Mingyu! Mar 21
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Jiangjiao’s paper on power flow optimization has been accepted to the International Journal of Electrical Power and Energy Systems. Congratulations to Jiangjiao! Mar 20
- Our 3D RNA inverse dsign paper accepted to ICLR 2026. Instead of chasing the sequence recovery rate, Tianmeng proposed new reinforcement learning guided alignment strategy that significantly improve the performance of inverse designed sequences that can be folded into the target structure. Structure matters! Jan 26
Previous news can be found from our news archive.
Contact #
Department of Computer Science
Room A1-D, Innovation Centre Phase 1
University of Exeter
Streatham Campus, North Park Road
Exeter, EX4 4RN, UK
E-mail: k.li AT exeter.ac.uk
Tel: +(44) 0139-272-4557