Paul Zhang

Founding Research Scientist @ Backflip AI
pzpzpzp1@gmail.com
Paul Zhang

I study generative 3D AI at Backflip AI, where we build tools to enable users to create and edit 3D meshes and CAD designs via AI integrated workflows.

Previously, I earned my PhD in the Geometric Data Processing Group at MIT CSAIL, advised by Prof. Justin Solomon. My research interests span the breadth of computer vision, graphics, geometric modeling, and machine learning. I am passionate about innovating technologies that enable faster, easier, human-computer interaction.

I have been lucky to spend a summer working at the Walt Disney Animation Studios on improved simulation methods, a summer at Sandia National Labs: PLATO on integrable frame fields and a summer at the Tokyo Institute of Technology studying quantum cryptography. Prior to MIT, I received my BS in Computer Science from the California Institute of Technology with a concentration in computer graphics and machine learning.

I am grateful to have been supported by the Department of Energy Comptuational Science Graduate Fellowship and the MathWorks Fellowship .

In my spare time, I enjoy cooking, foraging, and dabble in digital sculpting and rigging.

Peak at some side projects HERE.

Research

Symmetry-Robust 3D Orientation Estimation
Symmetry-Robust 3D Orientation Estimation
Christopher Scarvelis, David Benhaim, Paul Zhang
ICML 2025, Vancouver
Paper | Video | BibTeX
@inproceedings{scarvelis2025symmetryrobust,
  title     = {Symmetry‑Robust 3D Orientation Estimation},
  author    = {Christopher Scarvelis and David Benhaim and Paul Zhang},
  booktitle = {Proceedings of the 42nd International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2025) -- Poster Session},
  year      = {2025},
  month     = jul,
  address   = {Vancouver, Canada},
  note      = {Poster \#W-301, West Exhibition Hall B2–B3, July 17, 2025},
  url       = {https://icml.cc/virtual/2025/poster/43883}
}
Segment Any Mesh
Segment Any Mesh
George Tang, William Zhao, Logan Ford, David Benhaim, Paul Zhang
Arxiv 2024
Paper | BibTeX
@article{tang2024segment,
  title={Segment Any Mesh},
  author={Tang, George and Zhao, William and Ford, Logan and Benhaim, David and Zhang, Paul},
  journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.13679},
  year={2024}
}
Sum-of-Squares Collision Detection for Curved Shapes and Paths
Sum-of-Squares Collision Detection for Curved Shapes and Paths
Paul Zhang*, Zoë Marschner*, Justin Solomon, Rasmus Tamstorf (*equal contribution)
SIGGRAPH 2023 Conference Papers Proceedings
Paper | Video | BibTeX
@inproceedings{zhang2023sum,
  title={Sum-of-squares collision detection for curved shapes and paths},
  author={Zhang, Paul and Marschner, Zo{\"e} and Solomon, Justin and Tamstorf, Rasmus},
  booktitle={ACM SIGGRAPH 2023 conference proceedings},
  pages={1--11},
  year={2023}
}
Local Decomposition of Hexahedral Singular Nodes into Singular Curves
Local Decomposition of Hexahedral Singular Nodes into Singular Curves
Paul Zhang, Judy (Hsin-Hui) Chiang, Xinyi (Cynthia) Fan, Klara Mundilova
SIAM International Meshing Roundtable 2022 (Best Technical Paper Award)
Computer-Aided Design Volume 158, 2023
Paper | Video (DOE) | Video (IMR) | BibTeX 
@article{ZHANG2023103484,
title = {Local Decomposition of Hexahedral Singular Nodes into Singular Curves},
journal = {Computer-Aided Design},
volume = {158},
pages = {103484},
year = {2023},
issn = {0010-4485},
doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cad.2023.103484},
url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010448523000167},
author = {Paul Zhang and Judy (Hsin-Hui) Chiang and Xinyi (Cynthia) Fan and Klara Mundilova},
keywords = {Hexahedral mesh, Singular graph, Computational geometry}
}
Wassersplines for Neural Vector-Field Controlled Animation
Wassersplines for Neural Vector-Field Controlled Animation
Paul Zhang, Dmitriy Smirnov, Justin Solomon
Computer Graphics Forum, Proc. of the ACM SIGGRAPH / Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation, 2022 (Best Technical Paper Honorable Mention)
Paper | Supplemental Video | Video | Code | BibTeX 
@article {10.1111:cgf.14621,
journal = {Computer Graphics Forum},
title = {{Wassersplines for Neural Vector Field-Controlled Animation}},
author = {Zhang, Paul and Smirnov, Dmitriy and Solomon, Justin},
year = {2022},
publisher = {The Eurographics Association and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.},
ISSN = {1467-8659},
DOI = {10.1111/cgf.14621}
}
MarioNette: Self-Supervised Sprite Learning
Sum-of-Squares Geometry Processing
Zoë Marschner, Paul Zhang, David Palmer, Justin Solomon
SIGGRAPH Asia 2021, Tokyo
Paper | Video | BibTeX 
@article{marschner2021sum,
  title={Sum-of-squares geometry processing},
  author={Marschner, Zo{\"e} and Zhang, Paul and Palmer, David and Solomon, Justin},
  journal={ACM Transactions on Graphics (TOG)},
  volume={40},
  number={6},
  pages={1--13},
  year={2021},
  publisher={ACM New York, NY, USA}
}
Interactive All-Hex Meshing via Cuboid Decomposition
Interactive All-Hex Meshing via Cuboid Decomposition
Lingxiao Li, Paul Zhang, Dmitriy Smirnov, S. Mazdak Abulnaga, Justin Solomon
SIGGRAPH Asia, 2021, Tokyo
Paper | Code | BibTeX 
@article{li2021hex,
  title={Interactive All-Hex Meshing via Cuboid Decomposition},
  author={Li, Lingxiao and Zhang, Paul and Smirnov, Dmitriy and Abulnaga, Mazdak and and Solomon, Justin},
  year={2021},
  journal={SIGGRAPH Asia}
}
EIT-kit: An Electrical Impedance Tomography Toolkit for Health and Motion Sensing
EIT-kit: An Electrical Impedance Tomography Toolkit for Health and Motion Sensing
Junyi Zhu, Jackson C. Snowden, Joshua Verdejo, Emily Chen, Paul Zhang, Hamid Ghaednia, Joseph H. Schwab, Stefanie Mueller
UIST, 2021, online
Paper | Talk | BibTeX 
@inproceedings{zhu2021eit,
  title={EIT-kit: An Electrical Impedance Tomography Toolkit for Health and Motion Sensing},
  author={Zhu, Junyi and Snowden, Jackson C and Verdejo, Joshua and Chen, Emily and Zhang, Paul and Ghaednia, Hamid and Schwab, Joseph H and Mueller, Stefanie},
  booktitle={The 34th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology},
  pages={400--413},
  year={2021}
}
Medial Axis Isoperimetric Profiles
Medial Axis Isoperimetric Profiles
Paul Zhang, Daryl DeFord, Justin Solomon
Symposium on Geometry Processing, 2020, online
Paper | Video | Code | BibTeX 
@inproceedings{zhang2020medial,
  title={Medial axis isoperimetric profiles},
  author={Zhang, Paul and DeFord, Daryl and Solomon, Justin},
  booktitle={Computer Graphics Forum},
  volume={39},
  number={5},
  pages={1--13},
  year={2020},
  organization={Wiley Online Library}
}
Hexahedral Mesh Repair via Sum-of-Squares Relaxation
Hexahedral Mesh Repair via Sum-of-Squares Relaxation
Zoë Marschner, David Palmer, Paul Zhang, Justin Solomon
Symposium on Geometry Processing 2020, Online
Paper | Code | Video
Octahedral Frames for Feature-Aligned Cross-Fields
Octahedral Frames for Feature-Aligned Cross-Fields
Paul Zhang, Ed Chien, Josh Vekhter, David Bommes, Etienne Vouga, Justin Solomon
ACM Transactions on Graphics (TOG) 2020. Presented at SIGGRAPH 2020
PDF | Paper | Code | Video
Octahedral Frames for Feature-Aligned Cross-Fields
Discrete PolyCube Surface Flows
Paul Zhang, Josh Vekhter, Etienne Vouga, Justin Solomon
APS March Meeting Abstracts (Vol. 2019, pp. R56-002)
Abstract
Singularity-constrained octahedral fields for hexahedral meshing
Singularity-constrained octahedral fields for hexahedral meshing
Heng Liu, Paul Zhang, Ed Chien, Justin Solomon, David Bommes
ACM Transactions on Graphics (TOG) 2018. Presented at SIGGRAPH 2018
Paper
Quantum Strongly Secure Ramp Secret Sharing
Quantum Strongly Secure Ramp Secret Sharing
Paul Zhang, Ryutaroh Matsumoto
Quantum Information Processing 2014
Paper