Bio

Dr. Zhao is now an AI research and enginnering lead and also ever been a senior manager of AIML engineering in Apple Inc., Cupertino, California. She focuses on LLM based multi-agent system, RAG system for conversational search, and deep learning/machine learning modeling for intelligent data services and platforms. Before joining Apple, she was an assistant professor at Department of Computing, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HK PolyU) from 2016 - 2018. 

Dr. Zhao received her Ph.D. from Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, State University of New York, Stony Brook in 2010, advised by Prof. Yuanyuan Yang. She received her bachelor and master degrees from Department of Electronics and Information Engineering of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China.

Dr. Zhao's current research interests include LLM-based Multi-Agent System, Multimodal AI, Deep Learning for Causal Inference, Representation Learning, Recommender Systems, Knowledge Graph, Multimedia Analysis and Time Series Analysis. She has published extensively on various academic venues, such as KDD, AAAI, WWW, CIKM, TOIS, TMM, TMC, TC, TON, TCOM, TCC, etc. She has served as associate editor for IEEE Transactions of Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS), technical program committee for well-known conferences, including AAAI, IJCAI, CIKM, ACM MM and as the reviewer for premier journals, including TC, TCSVT, TON, JSAC, and TMC. Dr. Zhao was the recipient of Best Paper Award at IWQoS2019. She is the inventor of five issued US patents and another one pending US patent. She is a member of IEEE and IEEE Women in Engineering.

Research

LLM-based Multi-Agent System, RAG Sysetm, Multimodal AI, Deep Learning for Causal Inference, Graph Representation Learning, Multi-task Learning, Knowledge Graph Enhanced Recommender Systems, Multi-modal Deep Learning, Deep Learning based Multimedia Applications, Deep Learning for Time Series.

Teaching

COMP5434  Big Data Computing

COMP4434  Big Data Analytics

COMP5322  Internet Computing and Applications

Recent Research Projects and Demos

Multi-task feature learning for knowledge graph enhanced recommender systems [Paper][Code]

Graph representation learning with generative adversarial nets [Paper]  [Code]  

Propagate user preference on knowledge graph for recommender systems [Paper]  [Code]  

Visual-textual emotion analysis for online video: multimodal deep learning approach

Emotion-aware chatbot system for free-style small talks and domain-specific tasks [Demo Video]       

Publications

Conferences

[C39] Hongwei Wang, Fuzheng Zhang, Mengdi Zhang, Jure Leskovec, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li and Zhongyuan Zhang, "Knowledge Graph Convolutional Networks for Recommender Systems with Label Smoothness Regularization ," in Proceedings of the 25th ACM SIGKDD Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (KDD), 2019.

[C38] Hongwei Wang, Fuzheng Zhang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li, Xue Liu, Xing Xie and Minyi Guo, "Multi-Task Feature Learning for Knowledge Graph Enhanced Recommendation," in Proceedings of the Web Conference (WWW), 2019.

[C37] Hongwei Wang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li, Xing Xie an Minyi Guo, "Knowledge Graph Convolutional Networks for Recommender Systems," in Proceedings of the Web Conference (WWW), 2019.

[C36] Hongwei Wang, Jialin Wang, Miao Zhao, Minyi Guo and Xiaojun Hei, "Recurrent Memory Networks: Modeling Long Short-Term User Preferences for Session-Based Recommendation," under submission to the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI), 2019.

[C35] Yu Lei, Wenjie Li, Chengyao Chen and Miao Zhao, "A Reinforcement Learning Based Approach for Interactive Top-k Recommendation," under submission to the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI), 2019.

[C34] Zhuo Li, Jiannong Cao, Hongwei Wang and Miao Zhao, "Iterative Multi-Directional Triangle Long Short Term Memory for Wireless Coverage Estimation," under submission to the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI), 2019.

[C33] Hongwei Wang, Fuzheng Zhang, Jialin Wang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li, Xing Xie and Minyi Guo, "Ripple Network: Propagating User Preferences on the Knowledge Graph for Recommender Systems," in Proceedings of the International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), 2018.

[C32] Zhuo Li, Hongwei Wang and Miao Zhao, "Weakly Supervised Generative Adversarial Nets with Auxiliary Information for Wireless Coverage Estimation," in Proceedings of the International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), 2018.

[C31] Yu Lei, Wenjie Li, Haihui Tan, Chengyao Chen and Miao Zhao, "When Collaborative Filtering Meets Deep Reinforcement Learning," under submission to the 12th ACM Conference on Recommender Systems (RecSys), 2018.

[C30] Jia Wang, Jiannong Cao, Miao Zhao, Shan Jiang and Milos Stojmenovic, "Pattern-RL: Distributed Multi-Robot Pattern Formation via Deep Reinforcement Learning," under submission to the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 2019.

[C29] Yikai Xiao, Qixia Zhang, Fangming Liu, Jia Wang and Miao Zhao, "NFVdeep: Adaptive Online Service Function Chain Deployment with Deep Reinforcement Learning," in Proc. of IEEE/ACM International Symposium on Quality of Service (IWQoS), 2019. (Best Paper Reward)

[C28] Hongwei Wang, Jia Wang, Jialin Wang, Miao Zhao, Weinan Zhang, Fuzheng Zhang, Xing Xie and Minyi Guo,  "GraphGAN: Graph Representation Learning with Generative Adversarial Nets," in Proceedings of the Thirty-Second AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), February 2018.

[C27] Zhuo Li, Hongwei Wang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li and Minyi Guo, ``Deep Representation-Decoupling Neural Networks for Monaural Music Mixture Separation,'' in Proceedings of the Thirty-Second AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), February 2018.

[C26] Hongwei Wang, Jia Wang, Miao Zhao, Jiannong Cao and Minyi Guo, “Joint Topic-Semantic-aware Social Recommendation for Online Voting,” in the Proceedings of International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), November 2017.

[C25]  Yu Lei, Wenjie Li, Ziyu Lu and Miao Zhao, “Alternating Pointwise-Pairwise Learning for Personalized Item Ranking,” in the Proceedings of International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), November 2017.

[C24]  Xili Wan, Xinjie Guan, Junbo Wang and Miao Zhao, “Time Slotted Scheduling for Outdoor mmWave Mesh Networks with Performance Guarantee,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Computing, Networking and Communications (ICNC), January 2017.

[C23]  Miao Zhao, Bin Jia, Mingquan Wu, Heather Yu and Yang Xu, “Software Defined Network-Enabled Multicast for Multi-Party Video Conferencing Systems,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC), June 2014.

[C22]  Miao Zhao, Bin Jia, Mingquan Wu and Heather Yu, “Utility-Maximization Framework for Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP in Multi-User MIMO LTE Networks,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Sensing, Communication and Networking (IEEE SECON), June 2014.

[C21]  Dawei Gong, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Channel Assignment in Multi-Rate 802.11n WLANs,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference (IEEE WCNC), April 2013.

[C20]  Ji Li, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “OWER-MDG: A Novel Energy Replenishment and Data Gathering Mechanism in Wireless Rechargeable Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Global Communications Conference (IEEE GLOBECOM), December 2012.

[C19]  Miao Zhao, Ji Li and Yuanyuan Yang, “Joint Mobile Energy Replenishment and Data Gathering in Wireless Rechargeable Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 23rd International Teletraffic Congress (ITC-23), September 2011.

[C18]  Dawei Gong, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Topology Control and Channel Assignment in Lossy Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 23rd International Teletraffic Congress (ITC-23), September 2011.

[C17]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “A Framework for Mobile Data Gathering with Load Balanced Clustering and MIMO Uploading,” in the Proceedings of the 30th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM), April 2011.

[C16]  Miao Zhao, Dawei Gong and Yuanyuan Yang, “A Cost Minimization Algorithm for Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 7th IEEE International Conference on Mobile Ad-hoc and Sensor Systems (IEEE MASS), November 2010.

[C15]  Dawei Gong, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “A Multi-Channel Cooperative MIMO MAC Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 7th IEEE International Conference on Mobile Ad-hoc and Sensor Systems (IEEE MASS), November 2010.

[C14]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “An Optimization Based Distributed Algorithm for Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 29th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM), mini-conference, March 2010.

[C13]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks with Multiple Mobile Collectors and SDMA Technique,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference (IEEE WCNC), April 2010.

[C12]  Dawei Gong, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Joint Channel Assignment and Space-Division Multiple Access Scheduling in Wireless Mesh Networks,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference (IEEE WCNC), April 2010.

[C11]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Packet Scheduling with Joint Design of MIMO and Network Coding,” in the Proceedings of Sixth IEEE International Conference on Mobile Ad-hoc and Sensor Systems (IEEE MASS), October 2009.

[C10]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Bounded Relay Hop Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of Sixth IEEE International Conference on Mobile Ad-hoc and Sensor Systems (IEEE MASS), October 2009.

[C9]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Mobile Data Gathering with Space-Division Multiple Access in Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of the 27th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (IEEE INFOCOM), April 2008.

[C8]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Mobile Data Gathering with Multiuser MIMO Technique in Wireless Sensor Networks,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Global Communications Conference (IEEE GLOBECOM), November 2007.

[C7]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Applying Opportunistic Medium Access and Multiuser MIMO Techniques in Multi-Channel Multi- Radio WLANs,” in the Proceedings of the 4th IEEE International Conference on Broadband Communications, Networks, and Systems (BroadNets), September 2007.

[C6]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Opportunistic Medium Access Control in MIMO Wireless Mesh Networks,” in the Proceedings of 20th International Tele-traffic Congress (ITC-20), Ottawa, Canada, June 2007.

[C5]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “A Joint Design of MIMO-OFDM Transceiver and Power-Saving MAC WLANs,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference (IEEE WCNC), Hong Kong, March 2007.

[C4]  Miao Zhao, Zhenghao Zhang and Yuanyuan Yang, “Medium Access Diversity with Uplink-Downlink Duality and Transmit Beamforming in Multiple- Antenna Wireless Networks,” in the Proceedings of IEEE Global Communications Conference (IEEE GLOBECOM), November 2006.

[C3]  Miao Zhao, Huiling Zhu, Wenjian Shao, Victor O. K. Li and Yuanyuan Yang, “Contention-Based Prioritized Opportunistic Medium Access Control in Wireless LANs,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Communications (IEEE ICC), June 2006.

[C2]  Huiling Zhu, Victor O. K. Li, Zhengxin Ma, and Miao Zhao, “Statistical Connection Admission Control Framework based on Achievable Capacity Estimation,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Communications (IEEE ICC), June 2006.

[C1]  Miao Zhao, Huiling Zhu, Victor O. K. Li and Zhengxin Ma, “A Stability-Based Link State Updating Mechanism for QoS Routing,” in the Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Communications (IEEE ICC), May 2005. 

Journals

[J23] Chenchen Li, Jialin Wang, Hongwei Wang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li and Xiaotie Deng, "Visual-Textual Emotion Analysis with Deep Coupled Video and Danmu Neural Networks," vol. 22, no. 6, IEEE Transactions on Multimedia (TMM), June 2020.

[J22] Hongwei Wang, Jialin Wang, Jia Wang, Miao Zhao, Weinan Zhang, Fuzheng Zhang, Wenjie Li, Xing Xie and Minyi Guo, "Learning Graph Representation with Generative Adversarial Nets," IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering (TKDE), Dec. 2019.

[J21] Hongwei Wang, Fuzheng Zhang, Jialin Wang, Miao Zhao, Wenjie Li, Xing Xie and Minyi Guo, "Exploring High-order User Preference on the Knowledge Graph for Recommender Systems," IEEE Transactions on Information Systems (TOIS), vol. 37, no. 3, March 2019.

[J20] Yi Li, Fangming Liu, Qiong Chen, Yibing Sheng, Miao Zhao and Jianping Wang, ``MarVeLScaler: A Multi-View Learning based Auto-Scaling System for MapReduce,'' IEEE Transactions on Cloud Computing (TCC), Oct. 2019.  

[J19] Zhuo Li, Jiannong Cao, Hongwei Wang and Miao Zhao, "Sparsely Self-Supervised Generative Adversarial Nets for Radio Frequency Estimation," IEEE Journals on Selected Areas of Communications (JSAC), Special Issue on Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning for Networking and Communications, vol. 37, no 11, Nov. 2019.

[J18] Hongwei Wang, Miao Zhao, Jialin Wang, Xue Liu, Minyi Guo and Xiaojun Hei, "Renewable-energy-aware Deep Reinforcement Learning for Charging Scheduling of Electric Vehicles," under submission to the IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 2018.

[J17] Jia Wang, Hongwei Wang, Miao Zhao, Jiannong Cao, Zhuo Li and Minyi Guo, "Joint Topic-Semantic-aware Social Recommender Systems for Online Voting," accepted by Knowledge-Based System (Elsevier).

[J16] Zhisheng Yan, Miao Zhao, Xin Wang and Chang Wen Chen, "Towards Guaranteed Video Experience: Service-aware Downlink Resource Allocation in Mobile Edge Networks," IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology (TCSVT), vol. 29, no. 6, June 2019.

[J15]  Miao Zhao, Bin Jia, Jia Wang, Mingquan Wu and Heather Yu, “Performance Optimization on Dynamic Adaptive Video Streaming over HTTP in MU-MIMO LTE Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (TMC), vol. 17, no, 12, December 2018. 

[J14]  Xiwang Yang, Chao Liang, Miao Zhao, Hongwei Wang, Hao Ding, Yong Liu, Yang Li and Junlin Zhang, “Collaborative Filtering Based Recommendation of Online Social Votings,” IEEE Transactions on Computational Social Systems (T-CSS), vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 1 - 13,  March 2017.

[J13]  Miao Zhao, Dawei Gong and Yuanyuan Yang, “Network Cost Minimization for Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Communications (TCOM),  vol. 63, no. 11, pp. 4418 -4432, September 2015.

[J12]  Miao Zhao, Yuanyuan Yang and Cong Wang, “Mobile Data Gathering with Load Balanced Clustering and Dual Data Uploading in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (TMC), vol. 14, no 4, pp. 770 - 785, April 2015.  

[J11]  Miao Zhao, Ji Li and Yuanyuan Yang, “A Framework of Joint Mobile Energy Replenishment and Data Gathering in Wireless Rechargeable Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (TMC), vol. 13, no 12, pp. 2689 - 2705, Oct. 2014. 

[J10]  Dawei Gong, Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Distributed Channel Assignment Algorithms for 802.11n WLANs with Heterogeneous Clients,” Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing (JPDC), vol. 74, no. 5, pp. 2365 - 2379, May 2014.

[J9]  Ming Ma, Yuanyuan Yang and Miao Zhao, “Tour Planning for Mobile Data-Gathering Mechanisms in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology (TVT), vol. 62, no. 4, pp. 1472 - 1483, May 2013.

[J8]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Optimization Based Distributed Algorithms for Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (TMC), vol. 11, no. 10, pp. 1464 - 1477, Oct. 2012.

[J7]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Packet Scheduling with Joint Design of MIMO and Network Coding,” Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing (JPDC), vol. 72, no. 3, pp. 376 - 388, March 2012.

[J6]  Chao Liang, Miao Zhao and Yong Liu, “Optimal Bandwidth Sharing in Multiswarm Multiparty P2P Video Conferencing Systems,” IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (TON), vol. 19, no. 6, pp. 1704 - 1716, December, 2011.

[J5]  Miao Zhao and Yuanyuan Yang, “Bounded Relay Hop Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Computers (TC), vol. 61, no. 2, pp. 265 - 277, Feb. 2011.

[J4]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Efficient Data Gathering with Mobile Collectors and Space-Division Multiple Access Technique in Wireless Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Computers (TC), vol. 60, no. 3, pp. 400 - 417, March 2011.

[J3]  Miao Zhao, Ming Ma and Yuanyuan Yang, “Applying Opportunistic Medium Access and Multiuser MIMO Techniques in Multi-Channel Multi-Radio WLANs,” ACM/Springer Mobile Networks and Applications (MONET), vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 486 - 507, August 2009.

[J2]  Zhenghao Zhang, Yuanyuan Yang and Miao Zhao, “Enhancing Downlink Performance in Wireless Networks by Simultaneous Multiple Packet Transmission,” IEEE Transactions on Computers (TC), vol. 58, no. 5, pp. 706 - 718, May 2009.

[J1]  Miao Zhao, Yuanyuan Yang, Huiling Zhu, Wenjian Shao and Victor O. K. Li, “Priority-Based Opportunistic MAC Protocol in IEEE 802.11 WLANs,” International Journal of Sensor Networks (IJSN), vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 84 - 94, Feb. 2008.  

Book Chapter

[BC1] Miao Zhao, Ji Li and Yuanyuan Yang, "Joint Mobile Energy Replenishment with Wireless Power Transfer and Mobile Data Gathering in Wireless Rechargeable Sensor Networks," in Wireless Power Transfer Algorithms, Technologies and Applications in Ad Hoc Communication Networks, Springer, November 2016.

Patents

[P1] Dongqing Zhang, Hongbing Li, Miao Zhao and Heather Yu, “Multi-view Video Streaming with Fast and Smooth View Switch,” Grant, US Publication Number: US 9848212 B2, 12-19-2017.

[P2] Mingquan Wu, Miao Zhao and Heather Yu, “Dynamic Priority Queue Mapping for QoS Routing in Software Defined Networks,” Grant, US Publication number:US 9571384 B2, 02-14-2017.

[P3] Miao Zhao, Bin Jia, Mingquan Wu and Heather Yu, “Utility-Maximization Framework For Dynamic Adaptive Video Streaming Over Hypertext Transfer Protocol In Multiuser-Multiple Input Multiple Output Long Term Evolution Networks,” Grant, US Publication number: US 9369513 B2, 06-14-2016.

[P4] Yang Xu, Miao Zhao, Mingquan Wu and Heather Yu, “Multicast Tree Packing for Multi-party Video Conferencing under Software Defined Network Environment,” Grant, US Publication number: US 9338096 B2, 05-10-2016.

[P5] Zhisheng Yan, Miao Zhao and Xin Wang, “Network Assisted Video Service: A Service Aware Resource Allocation in Mobile Cellular Networks,” US Patent Provisional Filing 84671048, Sept. 2015.

[P6] Miao Zhao, Mingquan Wu and Heather Yu, “Systems and Methods for Connection Pooling for Video Streaming in Content Delivery Networks,” Grant, US Publication number: US 9124674 B2, 09-01- 2015. 

Professional Activities and Services

Associate Editor, Track Chair, Session Chair or Technical Program Committee Member:

• • Associate Editor, IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems, 2024 - 2026.

  • IEEE ICDCS'22, AAAI'20, IJCAI'19, IEEE ICC'19, ACM MM'18, IJCAI'18, IEEE SECON'18, CIKM'17, IEEE Globecom'16, ICC'16, WCNC'16, Globecom'15, WCNC'15, WCNC'14, WCNC'13, ICPP'13, PIMR'12, IC3'12, WTS'11.

  • Track chairs of Apple Machine Learning Summit 2022/2023/2024/2025/2026.

Referee for submissions to the following professional journals and conferences:

• IEEE Transactions on Multimedia, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology, IEEE Transactions on Computers, IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing, IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technologies, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, Springer Peer-to-Peer Networking and Applications, ACM/Springer Mobile Networks and Applications;

• IJCAI, ACM Multimedia, IEEE/Infocom, IEEE/Secon, IEEE/WCNC, IEEE/Globecom, IEEE/ICC, IEEE/PIMRC, etc.