Cristian Bodnar

Co-founder @ Silurian AI. Previously @ Google Brain, MSR, Twitter Cortex.

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I’m a cofounder of Silurian AI, where we are building AI systems that can simulate and reason about the physical world.

Most recently, I was as a technical co-lead at Microsoft Research for the Aurora foundation model—the first foundation model for the Earth System. Aurora brings together high-resolution weather, atmospheric chemistry, waves, and hurricane dynamics under a single AI model.

Before that, I completed my PhD at the University of Cambridge, under the supervision of Prof. Pietro Liò and as a recipient of the Microsoft Research PhD Fellowship (2021). I’ve spent significant time in industry and research labs, including stints at Microsoft Research (2022), Twitter Cortex (2021), Google Brain (2020), and as an AI Resident at Google X (2019). Earlier, I graduated with distinction from Cambridge’s MPhil in Advanced Computer Science, earning the Best MPhil Student Award.

research

  1. aurora.png
    A foundation model for the Earth system
    Cristian Bodnar*, Wessel P Bruinsma*, Ana Lucic*, and 8 more authors
    Nature, 2025
    PDF
  2. thesis2.png
    Topological Deep Learning: Graphs, Complexes, Sheaves
    Cristian Bodnar
    PhD Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2022
    Website
  3. parallel_transport.png
    Neural Sheaf Diffusion: A Topological Perspective on Heterophily and Oversmoothing in GNNs
    Cristian Bodnar, Francesco Di Giovanni, Benjamin Paul Chamberlain, and 2 more authors
    In Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 2022
    arXiv Blog Code
  4. cwn.png
    Weisfeiler and Lehman Go Cellular: CW Networks
    Cristian Bodnar*, Fabrizio Frasca*, Nina Otter, and 4 more authors
    Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 2021
    arXiv Blog Code
  5. mpsn.png
    Weisfeiler and Lehman Go Topological: Message Passing Simplicial Networks
    Cristian Bodnar*, Fabrizio Frasca*, Yuguang Wang*, and 4 more authors
    In International Conference on Machine Learning, 2021
    arXiv Blog Code
  6. ndp_exp.png
    Neural ODE Processes
    Alexander Norcliffe*, Cristian Bodnar*, Ben Day*, and 2 more authors
    In International Conference on Learning Representations, 2021
    arXiv Code
  7. sonode.gif
    On Second Order Behaviour in Augmented Neural ODEs
    Alexander Norcliffe, Cristian Bodnar, Ben Day, and 2 more authors
    Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, 2020
    arXiv Code
  8. q2opt.gif
    Quantile QT-Opt for Risk-Aware Vision-Based Robotic Grasping
    Cristian Bodnar, Adrian Li, Karol Hausman, and 2 more authors
    In Robotics: Science and Systems (Best Systems Paper Finalist), 2020
    arXiv Website