PhD Research Showcase

The Computer Science PhD Research Showcase is an annual departmental event to showcase the research of our PhD students, who have the opportunity to demonstrate their research, receive feedback, and exchange information. The departmental objectives are the following:
- to improve the student’sresearch communication skills,
- to provide to feedback related to the students’ research progress and presentation of their ideas and results,
- to encourage scientific exchange of ideas between students and faculty working in different areas, and
- to promote internal community developmentby getting to know faculty and peers.
PhD Research Showcase
Wednesday, November 5, 2025
10 AM - 1 PM
Elizabeth D. Rockwell Pavilion, M.D. Anderson Library (2nd floor)
Upon entering the library main doors, use the staircase or elevator to the right.
Follow signs to the second floor towards the Honors College
Schedule
- 10:00 AM: Welcome & Introductions
- 10:10 AM: Lightning Talks
- 10:35 AM: Poster Session 1
- 11:40 AM: Poster Session 2
- 12:40 PM: Closing & Awards
Participating Students
| # | Student | Poster Title | Faculty Advisor |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | Ali Alfageeh | Bridging Multilingual Prompting and Logical Analysis: Understanding Student Behavior through Prompt2Proposition | Amin Alipour |
| 26 | Saleh Abdulaziz Alkhamees | Trust in Generative AI among Middle Eastern Students An Exploratory Study at Saudi Arabia • Kuwait • Jordan | Amin Alipour |
| 11 | Rahma Aloui | Quality-Aware Clustering for Data-Centric Seismic Segmentation | Shishir Shah |
| 3 | Janet Yayra Anagli | DLADE: A Cluster Evaluation Framework leveraging Dataset Density Functions | Christoph Eick |
| 4 | Tadesse Kebede Bahiru | Codecard: Leveraging LLMs to Evaluate AI Model Code Development with the System Cards Framework | Ioannis Kakadiaris |
| 12 | Dipayan Biswas | Role of Speech Transcripts and Video Frames in Summarizing Presentation-Style Educational Videos | Jaspal Subhlok |
| 7 | Vu Minh Hoang Dang | Vocabulary Quality in NLP Datasets: An Autoencoder-Based Framework | Rakesh Verma |
| 13 | Xu Dong | A Provident and Resource Efficient System for NAS | Feng Yan |
| 23 | Adnane Gdihi | Multi-task framework MRI, image reconstruction, super resolution, 3D volume reconstruction | Lennart Johnsson |
| 6 | Robert Richard Griffin | Designing Mobile MRI Scanners: Optimization of a Magnet Array for a Tabletop Scanner | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 20 | Aayush Gupta | Fully-Distributed Construction of Byzantine-Resilient Dynamic Peer-to-Peer Networks | Gopal Pandurangan |
| 5 | Saba Khan | Region-Grounded Chest X-ray Report Generation with LLM-Driven Argumentation and RAG | Zhigang Deng |
| 2 | Michail Koumpanakis | Meta-learning Loss Functions of Parametric Partial Differential Equations Using Physics-Informed Neural Networks (PINNs) | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 16 | Xinyang Li | Robust Federated Learning via Privacy Efficiency and Dropout Tolerance Codesign | Feng Yan |
| 21 | Mahdi Manavi | A Novel Hybrid Quantum Classical Approach Leveraging Machine Learning for Enhancing Intrusion Detection in IoT | Guoning Chen |
| 24 | Cristina Marie Morales Mojica | Semi-Automatic Ontology Generation for Targeted Information Extraction of Software Issues | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 28 | Michael Patrick Murphy | Feasibility Index: A Metric for Evaluating MRI Reconstruction Consistency | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 1 | Hosein Neeli | OptiFlow: Deep Learning-Based Motion Estimation and Frame Interpolation for Brain MRI | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 18 | Oyekunle Oshidele | Continual Learning for Process Monitoring in Chemical Plants | Sen Lin |
| 22 | Sammy Tawakkol | An Active Machine Learning Model for Dynamic Redirected Walking Parameters | Nikolaos Tsekos |
| 10 | Khang Quang Tran | A Real-Time Immersive Augmented Reality Interface for Large-Scale USD-Based Digital Twins | Nikolaos Tsekos/Ernst Leiss |
| 15 | Bryan E Tuck | Guided Perturbation Sensitivity (GPS): Detecting Adversarial Text via Top-k Masking | Rakesh Verma |
| 14 | Zheng Wang | Rethinking Continual Learning with Progressive Neural Collapse | Sen Lin |
| 17 | Chad Duncan Weatherly | Continual Learning for Unsupervised Anomaly Detection in Dynamic Industrial Environments | Sen Lin |
| 25 | Ruofan Wu | Compose RAG: A Modular and Composable RAG for Corpus-Grounded Multi-Hop Question Answering | Feng Yan |
| 27 | Youyi Yang | Explainable Gaze Patterns for End of Turn in Multiparty Conversation | Zhigang Deng |
| 19 | Michael Sean Yantosca | Phonotomizer: A Compact, Unsupervised, Online Training Approach to Real-Time, Multilingual Phonetic Segmentation | Albert Cheng |
| 29 | Aryo Yarahmadi | Concurrent Transmissions in 802.15.4z Ultra-Wideband Standard | Omprakash Gnawali |
| 9 | Adeel Zafar | Automated Hairpin Vortex Extraction in Turbulent Boundary Layers | Guoning Chen |
Awards
Participants will be considered for the following awards:
- Best Poster
- Honorable Mention
- People's Choice
- People's Choice Runner-Up
For Fall 2025, all CS PhD students who have passed the PhD RCE exam or have started their third year and beyond are expected to participate.
Expectations and Timeline:
- Register by Friday, September 19, 2025.
- Registered students will be added to PhD Showcase course in Canvas
- Submit draft poster via Canvas course by Sunday, October 5, 2025.
- Attend Faculty Office Hours on Wednesday, October 15, 2025, 1PM-3PM, PGH 563. This will be to receive in-person feedback on your poster.
- Submit a final poster via Canvas for printing by Wednesday, October 29, 2025.
- Present on Wednesday, November 5, 2025.
Dates and times subject to change. Updates will be announced in Canvas for those who register.
Fall 2024
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Thomas Carroll - Work-In-Progress: Using Interaction Between Vehicles to Reduce Deadline Tardiness from a Route Assignment Perspective
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Michael Yantosca - ARTIC/Phonotomizer: An Adaptive, Real-Time Pipeline for Unsupervised, Multilingual Phonetic Segmentation
- People's Choice Best Poster: Meng-Chen (Martin) Lee - DialogueDiffu: Dyadic Conversational Co-Speech Gesture Synthesis
Spring 2024
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Robert Griffin - Designing Mobile MRI Scanners: Mass Efficiency of Halbach Ring Design Parameters
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Meng Chen (Martin) Lee - Online Multimodal End-of-Turn Prediction for Three-party Conversations
- People's Choice Best Poster: Vuong (Dustin) Nguyen - Contrastive Viewpoint-aware Shape Learning for Long-term Person Re-Identification
Spring 2023
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Urmila Sampathkumar - Statistical Shape Models for Outcome Simulation in Breast Surgeries
- People's Choice Best Poster: Urmila Sampathkumar - Statistical Shape Models for Outcome Simulation in Breast Surgeries
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Robert Griffin - Designing Mobile MRI Scanners: Mass Efficiency of Halbach Ring Design Parameters
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Meng Chen (Martin) Lee - Online Multimodal End-of-Turn Prediction for Three-party Conversations
- People's Choice Best Poster: Vuong (Dustin) Nguyen - Contrastive Viewpoint-aware Shape Learning for Long-term Person Re-Identification
Spring 2023
- Judge's Choice Best Poster: Urmila Sampathkumar - Statistical Shape Models for Outcome Simulation in Breast Surgeries
- People's Choice Best Poster: Urmila Sampathkumar - Statistical Shape Models for Outcome Simulation in Breast Surgeries
Organizing Committee
Dr. Guoning Chen, chair (gchen22@central.uh.edu)