Nikolai Merkel

Technical University of Munich (TUM)

Institute of Informatics

Boltzmannstr. 3, 85748 Garching b. München

nikolai.merkel@tum.de

I'm doing a Ph.D. in Computer Science at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Hans-Arno Jacobsen. My research interests focus on improving the performance of machine learning systems, with a particular focus on large-scale (distributed) Graph Neural Networks. Additionally, I investigate the use of machine learning to automatically optimize data systems.

Education

Ph.D., Technical University of Munich (TUM)
M.Sc., Technical University of Munich (TUM)

Scholarships

Max Weber Program of the state of Bavaria
Selected for an elite scholarship program supporting top-performing students at Bavarian universities with mentoring, training, and financial support.
Scholarship from the German National Academic Foundation
Awarded by Germany’s most prestigious scholarship foundation for outstanding academic achievement, intellectual ability, and social engagement.

Professional Service

Reviewer
  • ACM Transactions on Knowledge Discovery from Data (TKDD)
  • IEEE International Conference on Data Engineering (ICDE)
External Reviewer
  • Technology Conference on Performance Evaluation and Benchmarking in conjunction with VLDB
  • ACM/IFIP International Middleware Conference (Middleware)

Teaching

Advanced Master Seminar: Large-scale Graph Processing and Graph Partitioning
In my seminar, we explore topics in large-scale graph processing, including distributed GNN training, distributed graph processing, out-of-core (GNN) processing, in-memory graph partitioning, streaming graph partitioning, temporal graph processing, hypergraph processing, and graph generators.
Further, we investigate different aspects of vector search and machine learning-based optimzations for automatic tuning of data systems,
  • Summer Semester 2025
  • Winter Semester 2024/25
  • Summer Semester 2024
  • Winter Semester 2023/24
  • Summer Semester 2023
  • Winter Semester 2022/23
  • Summer Semester 2022
  • Winter Semester 2021/22
Exercises for Operating Systems and Hardware-oriented Programming
  • Winter Semester 2021/22