PhD Candidate at UCL
I am currently a research intern in the BIRD Lab (Blended Interaction Research & Devices) at Google. As a PhD candidate in the VECG Group at University College London, I conduct research on asymmetric collaborative mixed reality in both indoor and outdoor environments. I have a BSc and MSc in Computer Science and previously worked at Niantic Labs, Microsoft Research, and TNO Research as a research intern and at IBM as a data scientist.
At the core of my research is a passion for creating novel interactive systems that inspire meaningful connections and deliver intuitive, compelling user experiences. This focus has driven my exploration of diverse areas within computer science, including human-computer interaction, mixed reality, computer-supported cooperative work, computer vision, and generative artificial intelligence.
Education
Jul. 2021 — Nov. 2025
Ph.D. Computer Science
Topic: Asymmetric Collaborative Mixed Reality. Supervisors: Prof. Anthony Steed and Prof. Simon Julier.
Feb. 2018 — Oct. 2020
M.Sc. Computer Science
Track: Data Science & Technology. Graduated with the thesis titled “Generative RGB-D Face Completion for Head-Mounted Display Removal”, supervised by Prof. Pablo Cesar (TU Delft, CWI) and Dr. Frank ter Haar (TNO). A paper based on this thesis was published to the Virtual Humans and Crowds for Immersive Environments (VHCIE) workshop at IEEE VR 2021.
Sep. 2013 — Feb. 2018
B.Sc. Computer Science
Graduated with the thesis titled “A Comparative Performance Analysis of Feature Description Algorithms”, supervised by Prof. Michael Lew.
Working Experience
Dec. 2024 — Apr. 2025
Research Intern
Conducting research on the future of multimodal AI-driven AR interfaces at the Blended Interaction Research & Devices (BIRD) lab under the mentorship of Mar Gonzalez-Franco, Eric Gonzalez, and Harish Kulkarni.
Oct. 2023 — Jun. 2024
Research Intern
- Conducted research on the future of location-based AR authoring under the mentorship of Jessica van Brummelen and Gabriel Brostow as a part-time internship during my Ph.D. studies.
- Contributed to a first-author paper that is currently under review for ACM CHI ‘25, with a related provisional patent application.
May 2023 — Sept. 2023
Research Intern
- Conducted research within the EPIC group (Extended Perception, Interaction & Cognition) under the mentorship of Bala Kumaravel, Nicolai Marquardt, and Andy Wilson.
- Contributed to two co-first author papers at UIST 2024 (with two related non-provisional patent applications); one exploring 2D scene blending for teleconferencing and the other focused on 3D scene blending for telepresence.
Oct. 2020 — Jul. 2021
Data Scientist
- Worked on advanced systems driven by custom machine learning models, delivering direct business impact for enterprise clients.
- Communicated analytical findings to diverse audiences, steering strategic decision-making for internal and external stakeholders.
Feb. 2020 — Oct. 2020
Cloud Solution Architect Intern (Data & AI)
- Designed and engineered advanced data models and analytics solutions for global clients and internal Microsoft teams.
- Proposed and designed a data-centric methodology to enhance efficiency in data center construction process management.
Jul. 2019 — Aug. 2020
Research Intern
- Conducted research towards a novel approach to head-mounted display (HMD) removal within RGB-D images at the Intelligent Imaging group under the mentorship of Frank ter Haar.
- Designed and evaluated a generative adversarial network (GAN) for the joint inpainting of RGB-D images.
- Described the results in my master’s thesis as well as a paper presented during the VHCIE workshop at IEEE VR 2021.
Publications
Oct. 2024
SpaceBlender: Creating Context-Rich Collaborative Spaces Through Generative 3D Scene Blending
37th ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (ACM UIST 2024)
Oct. 2024
BlendScape: Enabling End-User Customization of Video-Conferencing Environments Through Generative AI
37th ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (ACM UIST 2024)
Mar. 2024
DreamCodeVR: Towards Democratizing Behavior Design in Virtual Reality with Speech-Driven Programming
31st IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (IEEE VR 2024)
Mar. 2024
StreamSpace: A Framework for Window Streaming in Collaborative Mixed Reality Environments
31st IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (IEEE VR 2024)
Mar. 2024
AIsop: Exploring Immersive VR Storytelling Leveraging Generative AI
31st IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (IEEE VR 2024)
Oct. 2023
Extending the Open-Source Social Virtual Reality Ecosystem to the Browser in Ubiq
28th International ACM Conference on 3D Web Technology (ACM Web3D 2023)
Mar. 2023
Ubiq-Genie: Leveraging External Frameworks for Enhanced Social VR Experiences
OAT: 2nd Workshop on Open Access Tools and Libraries for Virtual Reality (IEEE VR 2023)
Mar. 2023
Towards Outdoor Collaborative Mixed Reality: Lessons Learnt from a Prototype System
ReDigiTS: 2nd Workshop on 3D Reconstruction, Digital Twinning, and Simulation for Virtual Experiences (IEEE VR 2023)
Mar. 2023
Towards Understanding, Alleviating, and Exploiting the Effects of Asymmetry in Collaborative Mixed Reality
IEEE VR 2023 Doctoral Consortium
Mar. 2023
Immersive Competence and Immersive Literacy: Exploring How Users Learn about Immersive Experiences
Frontiers in Virtual Reality
Nov. 2022
Exploring User Behaviour in Asymmetric Collaborative Mixed Reality
28th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology (ACM VRST 2022)
Oct. 2022
Ubiq-Exp: a Toolkit to Build and Run Remote and Distributed Mixed Reality Experiments
Frontiers in Virtual Reality
Mar. 2021
Generative RGB-D Face Completion for Head-Mounted Display Removal
VHCIE: 6th Workshop on Virtual Humans and Crowds for Immersive Environments (IEEE VR 2021)
Mar. 2019
Star Tag: a Superhuman Sport to Promote Physical Activity
SHS: 1st Workshop on Superhuman Sports (IEEE VR 2019)
Teaching and Mentorship
2021 — 2024
Postgraduate Teaching Assistant at UCL
- Virtual Environments (COMP0113) with Prof. Anthony Steed
- Systems Engineering (COMP0016) with Prof. Dean Mohamedally
2022 — 2024
Mentor
- Molly Zhu (thesis project, UCL ME Computer Science): Real-Time Speech Captioning and Visualization in Collaborative Mixed Reality
- Rowan Meng (summer intern, UCL): Embodied LLM-based Programming
- Aiman Sohail (summer intern, Queen Mary University): Generative Storytelling in Social VR
- Pruetikorn Chirattitikarn (thesis project, UCL MSc Computer Science): Environmental Representation in Collaborative Mixed Reality
- Angela Yu (thesis project, UCL MEng Computer Science): Interactive Avatar Appearance Modelling with Generative AI
- Praveen Selvaraj (thesis project, UCL MSc Computer Science): Escape Room in Asymmetric Collaborative Mixed Reality
Service
Reviewer
2024
ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (ACM UIST)
2024 — 2025
ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (ACM CHI)
2024
IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (IEEE VR)
2025
Web Co-Chair
IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (IEEE ISMAR)
Grants and Awards
Oct. 2024
Departmental Travel Grant
UCL Computer Science
Jul. 2021 — Jul. 2024
Ph.D. Studentship
European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program (Project RISE), grant no. 739578.
Oct. 2023
Honorable Mention for Best Design Award at ISMAR 2023 Student Competition
Reviving the Euston Arch: A Mixed Reality Approach to Cultural Heritage Tours
Jun. 2022
UCL Nominee for Microsoft Research PhD Fellowship
Mar. 2019
Conference Travel Grant
Delft Sports Engineering Institute
Interests and Skills
Current Fields of Interest
Programming Languages and Frameworks
Software and Services
Current Work Eligibility