Education

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (Spring 2017)
PhD Candidate, Computer Science, GPA 5.0/5.0
Thesis: “Behavior-Driven Optimization Techniques for Scalable Data Exploration”
Advisor: Michael Stonebraker
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (August 2013)
MS, Computer Science, GPA 5.0/5.0
Thesis: “Interactive Visualization of Big Data Leveraging Databases for Scalable Computation”
Advisor: Michael Stonebraker
University of Washington, Seattle, WA, (June 2011)
BS, Computer Engineering, GPA 3.77/4.0

Appointments

University of Washington, Seattle, WA (Jul 2021-Present)
Assistant Professor, Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering
I co-lead the Interactive Data Lab with Prof. Jeffrey Heer.
University of Maryland, College Park, MD (Aug 2018-Jun 2021)
Assistant Professor, Computer Science Department
I led the Battle Data (BAD) Lab, which focuses on developing intuitive and interactive tools to support big data science.
University of Washington, Seattle, WA (July 2017-July 2018)
Postdoc, Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering
I worked with Jeffrey Heer in the Interactive Data Lab on characterizing user visual analysis behavior with standard visualization tools (e.g., Tableau), to: 1) inform the design of new visualization recommendation systems; and 2) to develop realistic workloads (and ultimately benchmarks) for testing the performance scalable visual analytics tools.
Microsoft Research, Redmond, WA (Summer 2014)
Research Intern
I worked with Danyel Fisher in the VIBE group, focusing on HCI and visualization. I developed new techniques for recording query provenance in data stream management systems. I used the resulting provenance data to design a more intuitive user interface for visually debugging temporal database queries. Our work was presented at CHI, a premier conference for human-computer interaction research.
Telenav R&D, (Summer 2012)
Technical Intern
I developed a tool for recommending relevant destinations to users planning a new trip via a GPS device or smartphone.

Grants and Awards

  • Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

    Sloan Research Fellow

    Year: 2023, Amount: $75,000

  • IEEE Technical Committee on Data Engineering

    TCDE Rising Star Award

    Year: 2022

  • National Science Foundation (NSF)

    Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE)

    CAREER Award

    Year: 2022, Amount: $570,541

  • VMWare

    Early Career Faculty Grant

    Year: 2021, Amount: $50,000

  • MIT Technology Review

    MIT TR 35 Under 35 Award

    Year: 2020

  • Adobe

    Data Science Research Award

    Year: 2019, Amount: $58,000

  • Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU)

    Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award

    Year: 2019, Amount: $10,000

  • National Science Foundation (NSF)

    Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE)

    Research Initiation Initiative (CRII) Award

    Year: 2019, Amount: $175,000

  • Schloss Dagstuhl/National Science Foundation (NSF)

    Travel Grant for Junior Researchers

    Years: 2017 and 2018

  • University of Washington

    Office of Postdoctoral Affairs

    Postdoc Travel Award

    Year: 2018

  • ACM SIGMOD

    Student Travel Grant

    Year: 2015

  • National Science Foundation (NSF)

    Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) Award

    Year: 2013

Leadership and Service

Co-Chair/Co-Organizer

PC Member

  • ACM CHI 2023
  • ACM SIGMOD 2023
  • EuroVis 2022
  • ACM CHI 2021
  • VLDB 2020
  • ACM SIGMOD 2020
  • IEEE InfoVis 2019
  • VLDB 2019 (Demos Track)
  • ICDE 2019 (Demos Track)
  • IUI 2019 (Senior PC Member)
  • VISSOFT 2018
  • ACM SIGMOD 2018 (Student Research Competition)
  • HILDA 2018 Workshop (co-located with SIGMOD 2018)
  • BigVis 2018 Workshop (co-located with EDBT/ICDT 2018)

External Reviewer: Journals

  • IEEE TVCG
  • CG&A
  • Information Systems
  • IJITM
  • TIST
  • TKDE

External Reviewer: Conferences

  • ACM CHI 2022
  • ACM CHI 2020
  • ACM CHI 2019
  • ACM SIGMOD 2018
  • IEEE InfoVis 2017
  • IEEE VAST 2015
  • VLDB 2015
  • EuroSys 2015
  • EDBT 2015

University/Department Service

  • UW Allen School Committe on Undergaduate Research (2022-2023)
  • UW DUB Summer REU Program Co-Chair (2022-2023)
  • UMD CS Undergraduate Honors Program Co-Chair (2019-2021)
  • UMD CS Diversity Committee Member (2019-2021)
  • UMD CS Faculty Search Committee Member (2019)
  • UMD CS Graduate Admissions Committee Member (2017-2018)

Teaching

Courses Taught

  • CSE 442: Data Visualization
    UW Undergraduate Course, Years Taught: 2022, 2023
  • CSE 512: Data Visualization
    UW Graduate Course, Years Taught: 2022
  • CSE 599: Interactive Analysis Systems
    UW Special Topics Graduate Course, Years Taught: 2021
  • CMSC 498O: Selected Topics in Computer Science; Introduction to Data Visualization
    UMD Undergraduate Course, Years Taught: 2019, 2020
  • CMSC 828D: Advanced Topics in Information Processing; Interactive Data Analytics
    UMD Graduate Course, Years Taught: 2018, 2019

Advised and Co-Advised PhD Students

  • Ameya Patil, UW (current)
  • Junran Yang, UW (current)
  • Hannah Bako, UMD (current)
  • Sneha Gathani, UMD (current)
  • Deepthi Raghunandan, UMD (2023)
  • Zehua Zeng, UMD (2022)