Team
Current Team Members
Dr.-Ing. Stefan Schulte
stefan.schulte@tuhh.de
Dr.-Ing. Stefan Schulte is a Professor at TU Hamburg and heads the module Cross-Blockchain Transactions of CDL-BOT. In 2010, Stefan finished his PhD at TU Darmstadt summa cum laude. He joined TU Wien in 2011 and finally moved to TU Hamburg in 2021. His research interests are in the areas of blockchain technologies and the Internet of Things.
Dr. Matteo Maffei
matteo.maffei@tuwien.ac.at
Dr. Matteo Maffei is professor and head of the Security and Privacy Group at the Vienna University of Technology. In CDL-Bot he heads the module for Lightweight Blockchain Protocols. After 11 years at Saarland University, he moved to Vienna University of Technology in 2017. His research interests include the formal verification of security properties and privacy-enhancing technologies.
Dr. Dominik Schallmoser
dominik.schallmoser@tuhh.de
Dr. Dominik Schallmoser is a senior researcher in the Institute for Data Engineering at the Hamburg University of Technology. In 2017, he obtained his PhD from the University of Salzburg, Austria. He works on principles of distributed computing with a focus on the analysis of randomized algorithms for distributed systems.
Dr. Anh-Tu Hoang
tu.hoang@tuhh.de
Dr. Anh Tu Hoang is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Hamburg University of Technology. He holds a Bachelor's in Information Technology and a Master's in Information Systems from Vietnam National University and completed his PhD at the University of Insubria, Italy, in 2020. His research focuses on privacy and security in data sharing, machine learning, and blockchain platforms.
Giulia Scaffino, MSc
giulia.scaffino@tuwien.ac.at
Giulia Scaffino is a PhD student at TU Wien. After her MSc degree in Nuclear Physics in 2019, she now works in the Security and Privacy Group of the Institute of Logic and Computation at TU Wien.
Elmira Ebrahimi, MSc
elmira.ebrahimi@tuhh.de
Elmira Ebrahimi is a research assistant and Ph.D. student at the Institute of Data Engineering, TU Hamburg. She graduated with an M.Sc. in software engineering from Tehran University. Her research interests are in blockchain security and privacy through the investigation of zero-knowledge proofs.
Dipl.-Ing. Markus Scherer
markus.scherer@tuwien.ac.at
Markus Scherer is a Ph.D. student in the Security and Privacy Group at TU Wien. Before joining the group, he received his master's degree in Computational Intelligence from TU Wien in 2016. His research is focused on the static analysis of bytecode languages.
Avik Banerjee, MSc
avik.banerjee@tuhh.de
Avik Banerjee is a research assistant and Ph.D. student at the Institute for Data Engineering at the TU Hamburg. After finishing his bachelor's studies in Computer Science and Engineering in 2017, he received his master's degree in Computer Science from the Universität Stuttgart in 2021. His research focuses on the optimization of smart contracts.
Max Kobelt, BSc
max.kobelt@tuhh.de
Max Kobelt is currently pursuing his master’s degree at TU Hamburg. He is also a student assistant in CDL-BOT.
Former Team Members
Dr. Michael Sober
michael.p.sober@gmail.com
Dr. Michael Sober is a Software Engineer at Amazon Web Services. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from TU Hamburg in 2025, where his research focused on enhancing blockchain interoperability. Prior to his doctoral studies, he completed his Master's in Software Engineering & Internet Computing at TU Wien in 2020, following his Bachelor's in Software & Information Engineering in 2018.
Dr. Subhra Mazumdar
subhra.mazumdar@iiti.ac.in
Dr. Subhra Mazumdar is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Indore, India. Before this, she worked as a Project Assistant at TU Wien, CDL-BOT, Vienna, Austria. She completed her Ph.D. in Computer Science in 2022 from the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata, India. Her research interests are applied cryptography, blockchain, and cryptocurrency.
Dr. Erkan Tairi
erkan.tairi@ens.fr
Dr. Erkan Tairi is a postdoctoral researcher at ENS Paris. He received his PhD from TU Wien in 2024, where he was a member of the Security and Privacy Group. His research interests lie in the foundations and applications of cryptography.
Dr. Lukas Aumayr
lukas@commonprefix.com
Dr. Lukas Aumayr is a postdoc at the University of Edinburgh and a researcher at Common Prefix. He earned his PhD from TU Wien. Lukas' areas of interest include distributed systems, applied cryptography, protocol analysis, and blockchain. His research focuses on blockchain scalability and interoperability. Lukas' works include advancements in payment channel network protocols, bridges, light clients, crypto-economic incentives, and BitVM.
Mahsa Bastankhah, Msc
mb6458@princeton.edu
Mahsa Bastankhah is a PhD student at Princeton University with undergraduate and master’s degrees from Sharif University of Technology. She has conducted blockchain research through internships at EPFL, TU Vienna, and IST Austria. Her current research focuses on the intersection of blockchain and artificial intelligence, investigating how decentralized systems can enhance AI safety and resilience, and how AI can improve blockchain efficiency and functionality.
Magdalena Solitro, Msc
magdalena.solitro@tuwien.ac.at
Magdalena Solitro is a Ph.D. student at TU Wien. After studying computer science in Verona, she received her Master's in Artificial Intelligence & Cyber security from the University of Udine. Her research applies formal verification techniques to analyze smart contracts and blockchain protocols.
Former Administrative and Student Team Members
- Ioannis Alexopoulos, TU Wien
- Dominik Apel, TU Wien
- Leon Esterbauer, TU Wien
- Carl Egge, TU Hamburg
- Tom Hillbrunner, TU Hamburg
- Maximilian Lohmann, TU Hamburg
- Theresa Müller, TU Wien
- Andrea Pelosi, TU Wien
- Margret Steinbuch, TU Wien
