Curriculum Vitae
Experience, education, and background.
PDF available here.
DownloadExperience
May 2026 - Present
Postdoctoral Researcher
Digital Worlds Institute, University of Florida
Leading human-behavior research for an AI-driven VR training platform for semiconductor manufacturing education, running generative and evaluative studies that shape embodied learning workflows and interaction design. Designed data-collection protocols and curated training data for a Visual Language Model (VLM) in PyTorch, turning raw multimodal user and task data into a structured, reusable dataset.
May 2020 - May 2026
Graduate Research Assistant
Embodied Learning and Experience (ELX) Lab, University of Florida
Designed and executed an end-to-end within-subjects study (N=41) comparing two LLM-based conversational agents on motivation, perceived relevance, and learning outcomes, using inferential statistics on behavioral and survey data to identify which design changed user behavior rather than self-reported satisfaction; built on a 3-version prompt engineering pipeline tested against synthetic personas before human participants, with bias review at each iteration. Led first-authored research on emerging devices, including an augmented reality mobile assistant tested with 43 participants to measure how physical context affects attention and recall, published across 2 papers on AR/mobile learning environments. Ran field deployment of a computation-based Making curriculum reaching 421 students across 20 public school classrooms, coordinating a cross-functional team of 10 researchers across 2 institutions and partnering with teachers and administrators to execute under real-world constraints. Designed and evaluated a movie recommender system built from participants own social media histories, running 21 concept-testing sessions to measure how users respond to personalization drawn from their actual behavior.
May - Aug 2022
User Experience Research Intern
Laboratory for Analytic Sciences (LAS), North Carolina State University
Conducted in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 16 practicing intelligence analysts to map information-passing workflows for an AI-driven tailored-reporting system; rare direct access to expert analysts (6 months-26 years experience across 5 intelligence specialties). Modeled and formalized information-flow architectures (how knowledge is captured, transformed, routed, and consumed across an intelligence organization) and translated operational requirements into system design implications; co-authored the resulting peer-reviewed paper; synthesized unstructured interview data via open coding and affinity diagramming. Delivered research readouts in rapid iteration cycles, tailoring communication to technical and non-technical stakeholders in an 8-week applied-research sprint.
Nov 2017 - Feb 2018
Content Writer
CrickMate
Published daily cricket articles applying SEO best practices - keyword research, on-page optimisation, and performance monitoring - to maximise article visibility and reach.
Sep - Dec 2016
Content Writing & Digital Marketing Intern
Contributed to online marketing strategy development and demonstrated product functionality to prospective clients, supporting user acquisition growth.
Education
2021 - 2026
PhD in Human-Centered Computing
University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
Dissertation: Designing and evaluating pedagogical conversational agents for personalized, interest-driven learning. Research areas: connected learning, personalized learning, mental wellbeing.
2019 - 2021
Master of Science in Computer Science
University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
Relevant Coursework: Human-Computer Interaction, UX Design, Research Methods for HCC, Qualitative Research, Statistical Methods fro Research, Information Visualization, Expressive Agents, Organizational Behavior.
2015 - 2019
Bachelor of Engineering in Information Technology
Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune, India
Relevant Coursework: Usability Engineering, Gamification, Theory of Computation, Advanced Data Structures, Software Engineering, Distributed Operating Systems, Computer Networks.