About me

As a child I intended a career in music but I have always been interested in natural sciences.  I received my  bachelor degree in chemistry from Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. I conducted my bachelor thesis research on thermodynamics of lipid bilayers with Professor Zhiwu Yu. 

I started graduate school studying quantum chemistry but soon was seduced by neuroscience.  I  did my graduate work in human color vision with Professor David Brainard at the University of Pennsylvania in the Neuroscience Graduate Group at School of Medicine.  In graduate school, I did 6 lab rotations ranging from measuring electrophysiological signals in central patten generators in crab to simulating networks of olfactory neurons.  I ventured out into courses beyond my major including Quantum Field Theory, Artificial Intelligence, 16th Century Counterpoint, and Stochastic Processes taught by incredibly inspiring professors, each slightly modified my view of the world. 

After my PhD, to further probe the brain,  I worked with Professor Alex Wade (now at University of York) at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute in San Francisco, where I investigated early visual processing of color and luminance signals using frequency-tagging and source-imaged EEG methods.  Fascinated by the challenging problem of material perception,  I did a postdoc in the perceptual science group under the supervision of Professor Ted Adelson in the Brain and Cognitive Sciences Department at MIT. In 2014, I joined the Department of Computer Science at American University, where I currently lead the Computational Perception Laboratory and teach a variety of courses in CS. 

In general, I am excited to work with students who has a solid background in one of the following fields: engineering, cognitive science, computer science, applied math, physics and other natural sciences.  We have an excellent CS master program at AU and a PhD program in neuroscience.  CS undergraduate and master students who is interested in the lab as research assistant is encouraged to contact me.