Mengzhao Jia

Ph.D. Student

Mengzhao Jia

I am a third-year Ph.D. student in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Notre Dame, advised by Prof. Meng Jiang. My research interests include multimodal large language models, multimodal reasoning, reinforcement learning, and vision-language-action models. Before starting my Ph.D., I received my M.S. in Computer Science and Engineering from Shandong University, advised by Prof. Liqiang Nie. I received my B.S. in Electronic Science and Technology from Shandong University.

Open to internships & full-time roles

I am currently seeking opportunities in multimodal AI, reinforcement learning, and vision-language-action models. Please reach out at jiamengzhao98 [at] gmail [dot] com.

Multimodal Large Language ModelsMultimodal ReasoningReinforcement LearningVision Language Action Models

Publications

MMTutorBench overview

01ACL 2026

MMTutorBench: The First Multimodal Benchmark for AI Math Tutoring

Tengchao Yang*, Sichen Guo*, Mengzhao Jia, Jiaming Su, Yuanyang Liu, Zhihan Zhang, Meng Jiang

* Equal Contribution

A benchmark for evaluating multimodal models on mathematical tutoring across insight discovery, operation formulation, and operation execution.

PaperCodeDataset
AutoRubric method overview

02Findings of ACL 2026

AutoRubric: Rubric-Based Generative Rewards for Faithful Multimodal Reasoning

Mengzhao Jia, Zhihan Zhang, Ignacio Cases, Zheyuan Liu, Meng Jiang, Peng Qi

A rubric-driven reward framework for improving the accuracy and faithfulness of multimodal reasoning.

PaperCode
Groupwise Ranking Reward overview

03arXiv 2026

Prioritizing the Best: Incentivizing Reliable Multimodal Reasoning by Rewarding Beyond Answer Correctness

Mengzhao Jia, Zhihan Zhang, Meng Jiang

A groupwise ranking reward that favors reliable, verifier-passed multimodal reasoning trajectories beyond final-answer correctness.

Paper
Leopard model overview

04TMLR 2025

Leopard: A Vision Language Model for Text-Rich Multi-Image Tasks

Mengzhao Jia, Wenhao Yu, Kaixin Ma, Tianqing Fang, Zhihan Zhang, Siru Ouyang, Hongming Zhang, Meng Jiang, Dong Yu

A vision-language model and instruction data for reasoning over text-rich, multi-image inputs.

PaperCodeDataset
MLLMU-Bench overview

05NAACL 2025

Protecting Privacy in Multimodal Large Language Models with MLLMU-Bench

Zheyuan Liu, Guangyao Dou, Mengzhao Jia, Zhaoxuan Tan, Qingkai Zeng, Yongle Yuan, Meng Jiang

A benchmark for evaluating multimodal machine unlearning and privacy protection in large language models.

PaperCodeDataset
MultiChartQA benchmark overview

06NAACL 2025

MultiChartQA: Benchmarking Vision-Language Models on Multi-Chart Problems

Zifeng Zhu*, Mengzhao Jia*, Zhihan Zhang, Lang Li, Meng Jiang

* Equal Contribution

A benchmark for multi-hop, comparative, and sequential reasoning across multiple charts.

PaperCode
Query-oriented micro-video summarization model overview

07IEEE TPAMI 2024

Query-Oriented Micro-Video Summarization

Mengzhao Jia, Yinwei Wei, Xuemeng Song, Teng Sun, Min Zhang, Liqiang Nie

A multimodal framework for generating concise, query-oriented summaries of micro-videos to support retrieval.

PaperCode
Describe-then-Reason training and inference pipeline

08arXiv 2024

Describe-then-Reason: Improving Multimodal Mathematical Reasoning through Visual Comprehension Training

Mengzhao Jia, Zhihan Zhang, Wenhao Yu, Fangkai Jiao, Meng Jiang

A two-step training approach that improves multimodal mathematical reasoning through visual comprehension training.

PaperCode
Counterfactual data augmentation for multimodal sarcasm detection

09AAAI 2024

Debiasing Multimodal Sarcasm Detection with Contrastive Learning

Mengzhao Jia, Can Xie, Liqiang Jing

A contrastive framework that reduces spurious textual bias for robust out-of-distribution multimodal sarcasm detection.

PaperCode

Work Experience

  1. Mar — Sep 2025

    Research Intern

    Orby AI · Mountain View, CA

  2. May — Sep 2024

    Research Intern

    Tencent AI Lab · Seattle, WA

Education

  1. 2023 — Present

    Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering

    University of Notre Dame, advised by Prof. Meng Jiang.

  2. 2020 — 2023

    M.S. in Computer Science and Engineering

    Shandong University, advised by Prof. Liqiang Nie.

  3. 2016 — 2020

    B.Eng. in Electronic Science and Technology

    Shandong University