Dissertation Lightning Talks

Six School of Interactive Computing PhD students will present 2025 Dissertation Lighting Talks. Presenters will discuss what their dissertation is about, methodology and what they are doing now, and what has been learned so far. The event will include talks by PhD candidates Adam Coscia, Qiao Zhang, Sichen Jin, Yao Dou, Jonathan Zheng, and Jin Yu.

1.    Adam Coscia 
Title: Visual Analytics for Trustworthy LLMs in Education
Short bio: Adam Coscia is a fifth-year PhD student in Human-Centered Computing advised by Alex Endert, whose research explores how visual analytics tools can help experts leverage and evaluate AI like LLMs for complex, data-driven tasks in critical domains including education, intelligence analysis, data science, and autonomous exploration of space and deep-sea environments. He engages in user-centered design with analysts, scientists, and engineers to create visual analytics interfaces that not only explain opaque AI behaviors, but also enhance workflow efficiency and domain experts' understanding of the data, revealing novel design implications for bridging cutting-edge AI, visual analytics, and interface design with practical, real-world applications.

2.    Qiao Zhang
Title: Understanding Human AI Teaming in Gaming Environments
Short bio: Qiao Zhang is a fifth year PhD student in Computer Science advised by Dr. MacLellan, whose research lies in the intersection of Artificial Intelligence and Human Computer Interaction. Using multi-player cooperative games as environments, Qiao develop agents that can interact with human to understand human-AI teaming dynamics from the perspectives of communication, collaboration and adaptation.

3.    Sichen Jin 
Title: Visual Analytics for Spatial Social Network Mapping and Analysis
Short bio: Sichen Jin is a fourth-year CS Ph.D. student at Georgia Tech specializing in GIS, visual analytics, and human-computer interaction. Her research focuses on developing a visual analytic tool for exploring how underlying geography affects social ties.

4.    Yao Dou 
Title: Building Interactive and Personalized AI with User Simulators
Short bio: Yao Dou is a fourth year PhD student at Georgia Tech advised by Prof. Wei Xu. His current research interests lie in natural language processing (NLP), especially text generation, evaluation and online user privacy.

5.    Jonathan Zheng 
Title: Probabilistic Reasoning with LLMs for k-anonymity Estimation
Short bio: Jonathan Zheng is a second year PhD student at the Georgia Institute of Technology majoring in computer science. His current research interests lie in natural language processing, specifically in the learning and reasoning process of large language models.

6.    Jin Yu 
Title: Designing With, Not Just For: How In-Depth User Research Transforms Interaction Design
Short bio: Jin Yu is a fifth-year PhD student in human-centered computing, focusing on co-design, educational technology, and interactive systems to empower youth as active creators of future technologies. Her work bridges physical computing and digital platforms, developing toolkits that support hands-on learning, prototyping, and collaborative design.