Carolyn Zech

PhD Candidate in Computer Science

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

I am a PhD student in the Foundations of Languages and Machines lab at MIT, advised by Rachit Nigam. My research focuses on type systems for hardware design.

Previously, I was a software engineer for the Kani model checker at Amazon.

I received my ScB in Computer Science from Brown University, where I developed a domain-specific language for enforcing software privacy policies as part of the ETOS group.

News

Apr 2026

Awarded a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.

Sep 2025

Started my PhD at MIT.

Jul 2024

Joined Amazon as a software engineer for the Kani verifier.

May 2024

Graduated from Brown and received the computer science department’s Senior Prize.

Jan 2024

Received an honorable mention for the Computing Research Association (CRA) Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Award.

Publications

Conferences

Kani: A Model Checker for Rust
Rémi Delmas, Zyad Hassan, Qinheping Hu, Rahul Kumar, Felipe R. Monteiro, Thanh Nguyen, Adrián Palacios, Celina Val, Michael Tautschnig, Justus Adam, Daniel Schwartz-Narbonne, Carolyn Zech
ASE 2026
Code
Parameterized Hardware Design with Latency-Abstract Interfaces
Rachit Nigam, Edmund Lam, Ethan Gabizon, Carolyn Zech, Jonathan Balkind, Adrian Sampson
ASPLOS 2026
Paralegal: Practical Static Analysis for Privacy Bugs
Justus Adam, Carolyn Zech, Livia Zhu, Sreshtaa Rajesh, Nathan Harbison, Mithi Jethwa, Will Crichton, Shriram Krishnamurthi, Malte Schwarzkopf
OSDI 2025
Code

Workshops

Verifying the Rust Standard Library
Byron Cook, Rémi Delmas, Zyad Hassan, Bart Jacobs, Ranjit Jhala, Rahul Kumar, Felipe R. Monteiro, Thanh Nguyen, Rebecca Rumbul, Michael Tautschnig, Celina Val, Carolyn Zech
NFM 2026
Verifying the Rust Standard Library
Rahul Kumar, Celina Val, Felipe Monteiro, Michael Tautschnig, Zyad Hassan, Qinheping Hu, Adrian Palacios, Rémi Delmas, Jaisurya Nanduri, Felix Klock, Justus Adam, Carolyn Zech, Artem Agvanian
VSTTE 2024

© 2026 Carolyn Zech; built with Zola