Barbara Martinez Neda
PhD Graduate Researcher
Project(s): Bash the Beast, PICARD
barbarm@uci.edu

Barbara is a Computer Science Ph.D. student. Her undergraduate research experience at Calit2 inspired her to apply to graduate school, where she continues doing research under Dr. Sergio Gago-Masague’s supervision. As a graduate student, her research focuses on utilizing machine learning techniques to increase underrepresented minorities’ representation in Computer Science.

Jason Lee Weber
PhD Graduate Researcher
weberjl@uci.edu

Jason Weber is a PhD student and aspiring educator in Computer Science at UC Irvine. During his MS in CS at Oregon State University, he conducted qualitative and mixed-method research on K-12 and undergraduate computing curricula. Currently, he’s exploring the intersection of AI and CS Education, where his research aims to understand how novel AI tools are revolutionizing the educational landscape and how AI techniques can be employed to enhance student learning and engagement. Away from research, Jason finds solace in a warm cup of coffee or espresso, especially on a rainy day. He’s always open for discussions centered around teaching CS.

Manuel Segura
PhD Student
mesegur1@uci.edu

Manuel is a Ph.D. Student working under Professor Sergio Gago-Masague. He has a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Mathematics from California State University, Los Angeles, and has a Master of Science in Computer Science from California Polytechnic University, Pomona. He also has 13 years of prior experience in the defense industry, mainly writing embedded flight software components for satellites that detect hypersonic ballistic missile launches, like the Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO) satellite constellation. 

Amisha Priyadarshini
PhD Student
apriyad1@uci.edu

Amisha is a PhD student in the Department of Computer Science, under the guidance of Prof. Sergio Gago-Masague. She graduated with a Bachelor and Master in Mathematics from National Institute of Technology Rourkela, India. She takes interest in the application of machine learning algorithms. She has worked on projects from the domains of deep learning and statistics. During the off-hours, she loves writing blogs and work on digital painting.

Richard Anthony Ky
PhD Student
kyr@uci.edu

Richard is a Computer Science PhD student under the guidance of Dr. Sergio Gago-Masague. He received his BS in CS from San José State University. His previous research experiences involved applying machine learning to various problems, including Parkinson’s treatment discovery, blood clot prevention, and smart power grid integrity. In his free time, he enjoys listening to and producing music genres such as atmospheric techno, jungle, and melodic trance.

Pere Vergés Boncompte
PhD Student
pvergesb@uci.edu

Pere Vergés Boncompte was born in Barcelona in 1998. In 2020, he graduated from UPC Facultat d’Informàtica de Barcelona (FIB), obtaining a B.S. degree in Computer Engineering, specialized in computation. In 2022, he graduated from UPC Facultat d’Informàtica de Barcelona (FIB), obtaining an M.S. degree in Research and Innovation, specialized in computation. While pursuing his Master’s, he was awarded the Balsells Mobility Program to complete his Master’s thesis at UCI. While pursuing his Master’s, he has been working at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center in Workflows and Distributed Computing as a Research Engineer. In 2023, Pere was awarded a Balsells Graduate Fellowship to continue his research for his Ph.D.

Natalie Perez
natalieperezeo@gmail.com

Natalie is graduated with a Master’s in Computer Science and working under the supervision of Professor Sergio Gago-Masague. She graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science with minors in Mathematics and Biology at Texas A&M University – Kingsville. During undergrad, she was a research assistant under the supervision of Professor Maleq Khan. After graduating, she worked as a fullstack developer for the Genomics Institute at UCSC and currently works for the Memory and Aging Center at UCSF.

Margarita Geleta
PhD Graduate Student
mgeleta@uci.edu

Margarita is a PhD student in Computer Science at ICS. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Data Science and Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC). She has led research on deep audio steganography at the Image Processing Group (UPC) and has interned at Bustamante Lab (Stanford School of Medicine) where she worked on deep learning methods applied to genomics. Her passion for research encouraged her to enroll into graduate studies at UC Irvine, where she will continue researching under the supervision of Dr. Sergio Gago-Masague.

Tianyi Hu
Project(s): PICARD
tianyih7@uci.edu

Tianyi (Tim) majored in Computer Engineering. He worked on the PICARD project under the supervision of Prof. Sergio Gago and Patricia. He was in the electronics team and responsible for the design/manufacture/testing of the PCB(Printed Circuit Board). He enjoys running, cooking, and photography in his spare time. His personal website: hutianyi.tech

Hamza Errahmouni Barkam
PhD Graduate Student
herrahmo@uci.edu

Hamza was a first-year PhD student in Computer Science at the Donald Bren. His undergraduate was in Telecommunications Engineering at Barcelona, Spain. His love for education and technology made him go for a Doctorate in CS and work with Prof. Gago and the ETAD lab. He worked 6 months on the implementation of software-defined radios on vehicle simulator Carla with Prof. Levorato during his undergraduate final thesis. His research focused on ways to use AI & ML on education and trying to make human bias less present on admissions.

Yue Zeng
Graduate Researcher
Project(s): FoodSmart
yzeng5@uci.edu

Yue Zeng graduated with a Master’s in Computer Science. She received her bachelor’s degree in computer science and business economics at UCI, during which she worked on the Food Smart project under the supervision of Dr. Sergio Gago-Masague. Her research interest was using machine learning to monitor and predict students’ performance in STEM majors.

Xi Chen
Android Application Developer
Project(s): Medicom, PET
diannachenxi@gmail.com

Xi was a UCI student majoring in Informatics under ICS.  She worked in several different data science projects where she was responsible for the analysis of raw data and the creation of thoughts and analysis. Her previous hands-on project experience taught her how to identify real-world questions, extract and analyze the data, then visualize and present the report. During the summer internship for Calit2, she also developed a strong background in Android application development and healthcare domain knowledge that has served her well in her pursuit to advance the interests of Healthcare information system.