Xiao HUANG
Assistant Professor, Department of Computing
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Research: large language models (graph retrieval-augmented generation, LLM-based text-to-SQL), graph learning (knowledge graphs, collaborative filtering), protein design. I am actively recruiting Ph.D. students and postdocs. Feel free to email me your CV.
[2025/10] Our ITF project Graph RAG has been funded.
[2025/10] I serve as an SPC member at AAAI 2026, PAKDD 2026, & EACL 2026.
[2025/10] We released three Graph RAG datasets.
[2025/09] I am ranked among the World's Top 2% Scientists (Stanford List) for 2023, 2024, and 2025, placing at 4,780 out of 458,615 researchers in the AI & Image Processing subfield in 2025.
[2025/09] Our Text-to-SQL Survey has been accepted by TKDE.
[2025/06] Novel graph learning: Graph as new language.
Selected Publications (more papers)
Retrieval-augmented generation
A Survey of Graph Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Customized Large Language Models, Qinggang Zhang, Shengyuan Chen, Yuanchen Bei, Zheng Yuan, Huachi Zhou, Zijin Hong, Junnan Dong, Hao Chen, Yi Chang, Xiao Huang, arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.13958, 2025. (GitHub)
Retrieval Augmented Zero-Shot Enzyme Generation for Specified Substrate, Jiahe Du, Kaixiong Zhou, Xinyu Hong, Zhaozhuo Xu, Jinbo Xu, Xiao Huang, ICML 2025.
KnowGPT: Knowledge Graph based PrompTing for Large Language Models, Qinggang Zhang, Junnan Dong, Hao Chen, Daochen Zha, Zailiang Yu, Xiao Huang, NeurIPS 2024.
LLM-based text-to-SQL
Knapsack Optimization-based Schema Linking for LLM-based Text-to-SQL Generation, Zheng Yuan, Hao Chen, Zijin Hong, Qinggang Zhang, Feiran Huang, Qing Li, Xiao Huang, IEEE International Conference on Data Engineering, 2026.
Structure-Guided Large Language Model for Text-to-SQL Generation, Qinggang Zhang, Hao Chen, Junnan Dong, Shengyuan Chen, Feiran Huang, Xiao Huang, ICML, 2025 (Slides).
Next-Generation Database Interfaces: A Survey of LLM-based Text-to-SQL, Zijin Hong, Zheng Yuan, Qinggang Zhang, Hao Chen, Junnan Dong, Feiran Huang, Xiao Huang, IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, 2025.
Each Graph is a New Language: Graph Learning with LLMs, Huachi Zhou, Jiahe Du, Chuang Zhou, Chang Yang, Yilin Xiao, Yuxuan Xie, Xiao Huang, ACL (Findings), 2025. (Code)
Dirichlet Energy Constrained Learning for Deep Graph Neural Networks, Kaixiong Zhou, Xiao Huang, Daochen Zha, Rui Chen, Li Li, Soo-Hyun Choi, Xia Hu, NeurIPS, 2021.
Towards Deeper Graph Neural Networks with Differentiable Group Normalization, Kaixiong Zhou, Xiao Huang, Yuening Li, Daochen Zha, Rui Chen, Xia Hu, NeurIPS, 2020.
Protein design
Retrieval Augmented Zero-Shot Enzyme Generation for Specified Substrate, Jiahe Du, Kaixiong Zhou, Xinyu Hong, Zhaozhuo Xu, Jinbo Xu, Xiao Huang, ICML, 2025.
Knowledge graphs
Knowledge Graph Embedding Based Question Answering, Xiao Huang, Jingyuan Zhang, Dingcheng Li, Ping Li, WSDM 2019 (ACM version, Slides, Code).
Collaborative filtering
Macro Graph Neural Networks for Online Billion-Scale Recommender Systems, Hao Chen, Yuanchen Bei, Qijie Shen, Yue Xu, Sheng Zhou, Wenbing Huang, Feiran Huang, Senzhang Wang, Xiao Huang, TheWebConf, 2024 (ACM version).
Graph Cross-Correlated Network for Recommendation, Hao Chen, Yuanchen Bei, Wenbing Huang, Shengyuan Chen, Feiran Huang, Xiao Huang, IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, 2024.
Services
Organization committee member: ICDE 2025 (PhD Symposium Chair), PAKDD 2026 (Doctoral Consortium Chair)
SPC member/Area Chair: AAAI 2026, PAKDD 2026, EACL 2026
PC member: ICLR 2022-2026, NeurIPS 2021-2025, ICML 2021-2025, IJCAI 2020-2025, AAAI 2021-2023, KDD 2019-2023, TheWebConf 2022-2023, CIKM 2019-2022, WSDM 2021-2023, SDM 2022, ICKG 2020-2021
Reviewer: TPAMI, IEEE TKDE, ACM TKDD, ACM Computing Surveys, ACM TOIS, IEEE Transactions on Cybernetics, IEEE Transactions on Big Data, IEEE TCSS, ACM TIST
Session Chair: WSDM 2023, IJCAI 2023
Editorial board member: Computers & Education: X Reality
Awards and Patents
Best Paper Award Honorable Mention at SIGIR 2023
Best Poster Presentation Award at PolyU Academy for Interdisciplinary Research Conference 2023
BEST PAPER at the International Conference On Web-Based Learning 2022, Tenerife, Spain
US Patent, KNOWLEDGE-GRAPH-EMBEDDING-BASED QUESTION ANSWERING, US 2020/0242444 A1
Media Coverage
Biography
Dr. Xiao Huang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computing at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He earned his Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Texas A&M University in 2020, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 2015, and a B.S. in Engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2012. His research interests encompass LLM reasoning, retrieval-augmented generation, text-to-SQL, graph learning, knowledge graphs, and recommender systems. His scholarly contributions are highly regarded within the academic community, amassing over 5,700 citations. He received the Best Paper Award Honorable Mention at SIGIR 2023. He has successfully led or completed seven research projects as Principal Investigator, securing total funding exceeding 5 million HKD. He serves as a PhD Symposium Chair for ICDE 2025 and a Doctoral Consortium Chair for PAKDD 2026. He ranked among the World's Top 2% Scientists (Stanford List) for 2023, 2024, and 2025. Before his appointment at PolyU, he gained valuable experience as a research intern at Microsoft Research and Baidu USA.