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Panelists

Yun Huang is an associate professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She is dedicated to innovating AI-based solutions that foster a synergistic relationship between humans and machines, enhancing educational opportunities to all and expanding access to community services. She is deeply committed to translating research into real-world benefits and making a positive societal impact. Her work has garnered support from respected government agencies such as the National Science Foundation (NSF), Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR), as well as from leading industry organizations such as OpenAI, Google, IBM Research, and HeyGen. Recently, she was selected for the 2024-25 Emerging Research Leaders Academy by the Interdisciplinary Health Sciences Institute (IHSI) at the University of Illinois. Huang earned her PhD in information and computer science from the University of California, Irvine. She received her bachelor's degree from the Department of Computer Science and Technology at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.

Kameron Wells is a seasoned data engineer and team leader currently driving innovation in baseball systems for the Boston Red Sox. With a background that spans professional sports, insurance, and apparel, Wells brings a unique blend of technical expertise and domain knowledge to every role. At the Red Sox, he leads a cross-functional team of engineers, video coordinators, and interns. He has overseen the migration of over 80 terabytes of data to the cloud and has spearheaded the automation of hundreds of legacy processes using tools like Airflow, PySpark, and Data Build Tool. Wellsis also deeply involved in integrating cutting-edge AI technologies, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, into the club's internal applications. His prior experience includes leading data infrastructure projects at The General Insurance and driving customer analytics initiatives at Under Armour, where he was the lead analyst for the UA Loyalty Rewards pilot. His work has consistently centered around delivering actionable insights, whether that’s through predictive modeling, dynamic dashboards, or scalable data pipelines. Wells holds a master's degree in information management with a focus in data analytics from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Knox College. He is also certified in Tableau, Power BI, and Data Science through HarvardX.

Yaoyao Liu is an assistant professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Previously, he completed his PhD in computer science at Max Planck Institute for Informatics and his BS in electronic information engineering at Tianjin University. He was also a postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins University. His research lies at the intersection of computer vision and machine learning—with a special focus on building intelligent visual systems that are continual and data-efficient. Liu's research interests include continual learning, few-shot learning, semi-supervised learning, generative models, 3D geometry models, and medical imaging.