I completed my PhD in computer science at Yale University, advised by Ben Fisch. Previously, I worked with Alessandro Chiesa at UC Berkeley and with Mary Maller at UCL. My research focuses on efficient constructions of cryptographic proof systems, including hash-based and lattice-based succinct arguments. I am a co-author of Marlin and ripp in the arkworks ecosystem.
Before graduate school, I was a security engineer at the Freedom of the Press Foundation, where I was a core developer of SecureDrop. I am currently looking for an industry research position.
Preprints & Submissions
Zinc+: SNARKs for Polynomial Rings in review
Alexander Abdugafarov, Albert Garreta, Amit Kumar, Michał Osadnik, Psi Vesely, Ilia Vlasov, Kai Zhe Zheng
Submitted to CRYPTO 2026 · Accepted at zkSummit14
A framework for building SNARKs over multiple rings simultaneously, including finite fields, the integers, the rationals, and polynomial rings. We introduce Universal Constraint Systems (UCS), a new arithmetization that captures bitstring operations, multi-field arithmetic, and ring-level operations with significantly reduced overhead compared to single-field approaches. Compiled with Zip+, a hash-based multilinear polynomial commitment scheme built on a new family of error-correcting codes (Integer Pseudo-Reed Solomon codes) supporting coefficients over all of these domains.
Publications
Efficient Hash- and Lattice-Based Proof Systems for Mixed Algebras
Psi Vesely
PhD Dissertation, Yale University, 2026
In addition to work appearing in other publications listed here, introduces RingSpartan, a polynomial interactive oracle proof that seamlessly mixes cyclotomic ring and base field arithmetic over both NTT and power basis representations, avoiding the circuit blowup of NTT unrolling and the costly quotient commitments of Galois-ring projection. Enables efficient in-circuit SWIFFT hashing over fields like BabyBear and Goldilocks, offering lattice-hardness security as an alternative to algebraic hashes like Poseidon. Compiled with Microlotus, a polynomial commitment scheme for the small base fields used in lattice cryptography, instantiating Basefold with random foldable codes and an odd-prime field tower for Binius-style packing.
available May
Orbweaver: Succinct Linear Functional Commitments from Lattices
Ben Fisch, Zeyu Liu, Psi Vesely
CRYPTO 2023
The first post-quantum functional/polynomial commitment to achieve O(log n) proof size and a sub-O(log2 n) verifier. Enables evaluation of linear functions and polynomials on committed vectors over cyclotomic rings and the integers. Preprocessing, inherently non-interactive, and structure-preserving (all making it recursion friendly). Supports logarithmic public proof aggregation.
A consensus-agnostic methodology for constructing ultralight clients via SNARK-based state transition proofs. Introduces a BLS-based offline aggregate multisignature scheme (where signers need not know their group in advance) and a SNARK-friendly composite algebraic-symmetric hash function.
Proofs for Inner Pairing Products and Applications
Benedikt Bünz, Mary Maller, Pratyush Mishra, Nirvan Tyagi, Psi Vesely
ASIACRYPT 2021 · zkSummit5
A generalized inner product argument for any bilinear map, applied to pairing-based languages. Yields the first polynomial commitment with succinct (logarithmic) verification and O(√n) prover complexity for evaluation proofs, the first concretely efficient protocol for aggregating Groth16 proofs without recursion, and a low-memory SNARK with significantly faster proving.
Marlin: Preprocessing zkSNARKs with Universal and Updatable SRS
Alessandro Chiesa, Yuncong Hu, Mary Maller, Pratyush Mishra, Psi Vesely, Nicholas Ward
EUROCRYPT 2020
A methodology for constructing preprocessing zkSNARKs where the structured reference string is universal and updatable, via a novel use of holographic IOPs. Achieves an order-of-magnitude improvement in proving time and 3× faster verification over the prior state of the art, with smaller SRS and argument size.
Advised by Ben Fisch. Dissertation: Efficient Hash- and Lattice-Based Proof Systems for Mixed Algebras. Supported by an Ethereum Foundation research grant.
