Principle Investigators

Prof. Xin Tong | Ph.D.

Dr. Xin Tong is currently affiliated with the Pervasive Wellbeing Technology Lab at Stanford University and is a Research Associate there. She’s joining Duke Kunshan University, Duke’s campus in China, as an Assistant Professor in Computation and Design, starting Fall 2021. Dr. Tong has been an instructor teaching undergrad courses, including games, VR, human-computer interaction (HCI) related courses. Previously, Dr. Tong was a member of Pain Studies Lab , and she received her Ph.D. at School of Interactive Arts and Technology (SIAT), Simon Fraser University (SFU), advised by Dr. Diane Gromala, Dr. Chris Shaw, and Dr. Dave Fracchia. Before her PhD, she received her M.Sc. from SIAT SFU and her Bachelor’s in Electronic Engineering from BUPT. Xin also worked as Research Associate at Peking University from 2018 to 2019, Tsinghua University from 2012 to 2013. Dr. Tong has published in many top academic conferences and journals on HCI, VR, games, and embodied interface technologies. She is the recipient of Best Game Awards and Nominations at ACM CHI and Microsoft Unite Conference. She is also a recipient of many national and university fellowships and awards, such as SFU Provost Prize of Distinction Award, C.D. Nelson Memorial Scholarship, MITACS Research Training Award, SFU Big Data Graduate Scholarship, McQuarrie Chronic Pain Scholarship, and NSERC Post-doc Fellowship. Know more about here on the website: https://xintong.ca/

Prof. Luyao Zhang | Ph.D.

Luyao (Sunshine) Zhang short bio:

Luyao (Sunshine) Zhang is Assistant Professor of Economics and Senior Research Scientist at the Data Science Research Center at Duke Kunshan University (DKU). She has an abiding passion for interdisciplinary collaborations, especially for cutting-edge research of both profound insights and practical impacts, including Computational Economics (Algorithmic Game Theory and Mechanism Design), Explainable Artificial Intelligence (Machine Learning, AI Trust, Human-Computer Interaction), Cryptoeconomics (Blockchain for social good, Consensus Algorithms, DeFi), Behavioral Science (Bounded Rationality, Trust, and Cooperation), and Interdisciplinary Big Data (Social Media, Sustainability, and Global Health). Her current research interests are at the interplay of computational science and social science around the application scenarios of Blockchain. Her publications appear in economic journals for general interest and beyond, including American Economic Review: Papers and Proceedings, the Review of Economics and Statistics, the World Economy, Nature Scientific Data, Nature Social Indicators Research, ACM CCS, AAAI/ACM AIES, IEEE International Conference on Blockchain Proceedings, Remote Sensing, Journal of Digital Earth, Data and Information Management, etc. She received Ph.D. in Economics at Ohio State University, supported by Presidential Fellowship and NSF dissertation grant. She graduated from Peking University with a B.A. in Economics and a B.S. in Math and Applied Math. She holds Blockchain Strategy Certificate at Oxford University and more than 30 data science certificates. She is currently supported by National Science Foundation in China for her research agenda entitled “Trust Mechanism Design on Blockchain: An Interdisciplinary Approach of Game Theory, Reinforcement Learning, and Human-Computer Interactions.” Know more about her on the duke scholar page: https://scholars.duke.edu/person/luyao.zhang.