Madhusudhan Reddy Pittu

madhusudhan.p@nyu.edu

New York, NY

I am a Postdoctoral Associate at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, starting September 2025, where I work with Anupam Gupta.

I received my Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University in the Algorithms, Combinatorics, and Optimization (ACO) program, advised by Anupam Gupta and, during my final year, David P. Woodruff. Prior to that, I earned my B.Tech. in Computer Science from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur.

My research interests lie broadly in Theoretical Computer Science, with a focus on Approximation Algorithms, Online Algorithms, Combinatorics, and Optimization. I am particularly interested in problems with a geometric flavor.

Outside of research, I enjoy reflecting on philosophical questions and watching movies.

selected publications

STOC

Combinatorial Optimization using Comparison Oracles

Vincent Cohen-Addad, Tommaso d’Orsi, Anupam Gupta, and 7 more authors

In ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC), 2026

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2026comparison,
  title = {Combinatorial Optimization using Comparison Oracles},
  author = {Cohen-Addad, Vincent and d'Orsi, Tommaso and Gupta, Anupam and Guruganesh, Guru and Lee, Euiwoong and Paes Leme, Renato and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Panigrahi, Debmalya and Schneider, Jon and Woodruff, David P.},
  booktitle = {ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC)},
  year = {2026},
}

ICALP

Guessing Efficiently for Constrained Subspace Approximation

Aditya Bhaskara, Sepideh Mahabadi, Madhusudhan Pittu, and 2 more authors

In International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP), 2025

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2025subspace,
  title = {Guessing Efficiently for Constrained Subspace Approximation},
  author = {Bhaskara, Aditya and Mahabadi, Sepideh and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Vakilian, Ali and Woodruff, David P.},
  booktitle = {International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP)},
  year = {2025},
}

SODA

Approximation Algorithms for the Weighted Nash Social Welfare via Convex and Non-Convex Programs

Adam Brown, Aditi Laddha, Madhusudhan Pittu, and 1 more author

In ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA), 2024

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2024nsw,
  title = {Approximation Algorithms for the Weighted Nash Social Welfare via Convex and Non-Convex Programs},
  author = {Brown, Adam and Laddha, Aditi and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Singh, Mohit},
  booktitle = {ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA)},
  year = {2024},
}

FOCS

The Price of Explainability for Clustering

Anupam Gupta, Madhusudhan Pittu, Ola Svensson, and 1 more author

In IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS), 2023

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2023explainability,
  title = {The Price of Explainability for Clustering},
  author = {Gupta, Anupam and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Svensson, Ola and Yuan, Rachel},
  booktitle = {IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS)},
  year = {2023},
}

FOCS

Determinant Maximization via Matroid Intersection Algorithms

Adam Brown, Aditi Laddha, Madhusudhan Pittu, and 2 more authors

In IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS), 2022

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2022detmax,
  title = {Determinant Maximization via Matroid Intersection Algorithms},
  author = {Brown, Adam and Laddha, Aditi and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Singh, Mohit and Tetali, Prasad},
  booktitle = {IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS)},
  year = {2022},
}

SODA

A 3-Approximation Algorithm for Maximum Independent Set of Rectangles

Waldo Gálvez, Arindam Khan, Mathieu Mari, and 3 more authors

In ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA), 2022

Bib HTML

@inproceedings{pittu2022misr3,
  title = {A 3-Approximation Algorithm for Maximum Independent Set of Rectangles},
  author = {G\'{a}lvez, Waldo and Khan, Arindam and Mari, Mathieu and M\"{o}mke, Tobias and Pittu, Madhusudhan and Wiese, Andreas},
  booktitle = {ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms (SODA)},
  year = {2022},
}