Dr. Jiahua Xu is an Associate Professor in Financial Computing at University College London and Programme Director of the MSc in Emerging Digital Technologies. Her research focuses on blockchain economics, finance, and insurance, where she explores the impact of distributed ledger technology on financial systems and market design. She has held research roles at Harvard University and EPFL, and earned her PhD from the University of St. Gallen, an MSc from the University of Mannheim, and a BBA from Fudan University. Beyond academia, Dr. Xu actively contributes to the blockchain research community, publishing on crypto-finance, decentralized markets, and insurance, and engaging with initiatives such as TEAconf