Topics (Winter 2025/26)

Please read the general course information first.

We list specific aspects that are of interest to one or more members of our research group. By selecting three of these as your desired seminar/project topics, you signal to us which aspects are most interesting to you.

Feel free to propose your own topics, or variants of existing topics, but note that we only offer topics that we believe we can actually supervise adequately.

Applications

An important part of programming language design is the study of repeating patterns in the design of programming languages, a succinct and correct description of their behavior, further extension and generalization to make them more powerful, and then again the search for intuitive examples of their use. Here are a few applications of programming language techniques to diverse domains:

C1: Geodistributed Programming with Gallifrey Seminar
C2: Serialization with Pickler Combinators in Scala Seminar
D2: Recent Advances in Probabilistic Programming Seminar
S1: Functional Choreographies with Pirouette Seminar
T1: Type Systems for Array Programming Seminar
XB: Convergent Replicated Datatypes in Lean Project
XC: Collaborative Rich Text Editing (Peritext) in Scala Project

Techniques

Programming language techniques beyond those present in mainstream languages are often useful to solve a wide range of problems in different domains. Often advanced functional programming takes inspiration from logic and math. The following papers are more abstract, and open to multiple domains. This might require some thought on your side to come up with a concrete scenario as an example application yourself:

Choose from these specific proposals, or suggest a topic of your own:

B1: Effects and Handlers with Koka or Flix Seminar
D1: From Quantified Type Theory to Modal Type Theory Seminar
R1: Verification-Aware Programming with Dafny Seminar
S2: Freer Arrows and Why You Need Them in Haskell Seminar
T2: Reasoning about Programs with Type Isomorphisms Seminar
XD1: Advanced Functional Programming in Lean Project
XD2: Designing Lesson for Typesystem Teaching Project
XS: Towards "Parallel" Effect Handlers in Lean Project
XT: Formalizing Programming Languages in Lean Project

Related Courses

For related topics, also take a look at the general course offers by our research group:

Specifically, in you may be interested in:

Thematically related may be this seminar offered by friends:

If our topics are too formal for you, consider these cool seminars and projects offered by our friend Isabella Graßl: