Fei Xia, Ph.D., Principle Investigator. (pronounced Faye SHEE-ah)
Email: fei.xia[at] uci.edu | [Google Scholar] | [Linkedin] | [CV]
Fei is an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), an affiliated faculty member at Beckman Laser Institute and Medical Clinic, Department of Biomedical Engineering and Graduate program in Chemical, Applied, and Materials Physics at the University of California, Irvine. She completed her Ph.D. at Cornell and her postdoc at École Normale Supérieure (ENS) in Paris. She leads a research team working at the interface of optics, computation, and biomedicine, with a particular interest in designing smart optical systems to image, sense, and process biomedical information probed by light. She aims to provide innovative solutions to challenging biomedical needs through the co-design of hardware and software. Fei has been recognized by several major awards and honors, including the Scialog Fellow for RCSA Initiative, Rising Star in Light, Optica Foundation Challenge Award, Seal of Excellence for Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship, the SPIE Women in Optics, Data Open Championship and the Mong NeuroTech Fellowship.
Members
Jyothsna Konkada Manattayil, Ph.D., Postdoc
Email: jkonkada[at]uci.edu | [Google Scholar] | [Linkedin]
Jyothsna is a postdoc in the lab. She received her Ph.D. in Photonics at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, India. She has hands-on experience in designing and developing custom optical setups for biomedical and nanophotonic applications. She is interested in experimental photonics for biomedical imaging, diagnostics, and sensing. She is also keen on computational imaging.
Ming-Liang Wei, EECS PhD student
Email: mlwei[at]uci.edu | [Google Scholar] | [Linkedin]
Ming-Liang is a Ph.D. student in EECS at UC Irvine (2025 Fall). He received his M.S. in Medical Engineering from Caltech, and his B.S. and M.S. from National Taiwan University in Physics and Zoology, and in Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, respectively. His research focuses on nonlinear microscopy, clinical trials, and quantitative analysis. He is particularly interested in lasers, optical systems, and bioimaging.
Award: EECS Department Fellowship
Yunong Sun, EECS PhD student
Email: yunongs1[at]uci.edu | [Google Scholar] | [Linkedin] | [Website]
Yunong is a Ph.D student in EECS at UC Irvine (2025 Fall). He received his bachelor's and master's degrees in EE from Huazhong University of Science and Technology and Xi'an Jiaotong University respectively. Now, he is interested in computational speckle imaging and low-level computer vision.
Award: Henry Samueli Endowed Fellowship
Sicheng Chen, EECS PhD student
Email: sichenc5[at]uci.edu | [Google Scholar] | [Linkedin] | [Website]
Sicheng is a Ph.D student in EECS at UC Irvine (2025 Fall). He received his bachelor's and master's degrees in EE from Xi'an Jiaotong University and UC Irvine respectively. Now, he is interested in digital pathology diagnosis.
Award: Henry Samueli Endowed Fellowship, Best Oral Presentation Award, Emerging Topics in AI, SPIE Optics+Photonics conference
Dayuan Ni, Physics PhD student
[Joint with Prof. Mihaela Balu]
Email: dayuann1[at]uci.edu | [linkedin]
Dayuan is a Ph.D student in Physics at UC Irvine (2024 Fall). He received his bachelor's degree in Physics from Tsinghua University.
Award: Outstanding Graduate Student Award in Physics (Marco Vekic Memorial Award)
Aidan Fernandez, EECS PhD student
Email: aidanf4[at]uci.edu | [linkedin]
Aidan is Ph.D student in EECS at UC Irvine (2026 Fall). He received his bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering in California State University, Bakersfield. He worked with us since summer 2025 and decided to stay for his Ph.D. study.
Award: Cal-bridge PhD Fellowship, EECS Department Fellowship
Chad Wong, EECS Undergraduate student, UROP Fellow
Email: chadkw[at]uci.edu
Chad is an undergraduate electrical engineering student at UC Irvine who is specializing in signal processing and semiconductors/photonics. He is interested in researching computer vision and optical devices for medical purposes.
Kassandra Pham, Public Health Sciences Undergraduate student, UROP Fellow
Email: kassanpp[at]uci.edu
Kassandra is an undergraduate student at UC Irvine studying Public Health Sciences. She is interested in integrating optics and computational approaches to develop imaging solutions that enhance diagnostic efficiency.
Alumni
Oscar Alvarez Harth, Applied Physics and EE Undergraduate student (fall 2025-srping 2026)
Nicholas Baldivino, Applied Physics Undergraduate student (fall 2025-srping 2026), UROP Fellow
Tiffany Zhang, Computer Science and Engineering Undergraduate student (fall 2025), UROP Fellow
Theone Martin, Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate student (fall 2025-spring 2026), UROP Fellow
Bohao Dang, Master’s Thesis student (fall 2025-summer 2026), next: Research Assistant at UC Irvine.
Aileen Kim, UROP EECS undergraduate student (fall 2025-spring 2026), next: ECE master student at UIUC.
Joonhyuk Seo, EECS student and research collaborator (fall 2025-spring 2026), next: AI researcher at SIA (SI Analytics)
Aidan Fernandez, Cal-bridge undergraduate intern (Summer 2025), next: Ph.D. student at UC Irvine
Rashad Hall, Cal-bridge undergraduate intern (Summer 2025)
Haichuan Liu, Undergraduate summer student (Summer 2025)
Nithin Aruswamy, High school student intern (Summer 2025), next: undergrad in Operations Research & Math at UC Berkeley
Albert Li, High school student intern (Summer 2025), next: undergraduate student at Johns Hopkins University
Jacob Wu, High school student intern (Summer 2025)
Nanxuan Li, EECS MS student (Fall 2025-Fall 2026), next: Image Algorithm Engineer at VIVO