PDS Winners of Spring 2021

Ali Binaie

Ali Binaie

Ali Binaie received the B.S. degree (Hons.) from Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran, in 2012, and the M.Sc. degree from the Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, in 2014. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering with Columbia University. He was a recipient of the Best Student Paper Award (Second Place) at the IEEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits Symposium (RFIC), Jean Bennett memorial student grant award at the OSA Frontiers in Optics and Laser Science (FiO+LS) conference, and IEEE Solid-State Circuits Society (SSCS) Predoctoral Achievement Award in 2020.

Yun Shang

Yun Shang

Yun Shang currently is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University. Yun joined the Columbia MR SCIENCE laboratory in 2017, and his research interest is multi-coil development and dynamic shimming techniques on human body to enable better clinical solutions.

Before his Ph.D. program, Yun worked in MRI system development at Philips for more than 5 years, focusing on MR system architecture, system integration, and system calibrations. Yun completed his master’s degree at the East China Normal University in Shanghai, with his bachelor’s degree at the University of Shanghai for Science and Technology. 

Jiaxue Xu

Jiaxue Xu

Jiaxue Xu is an M.S. Business Analytics student at Columbia University. Before she came to Columbia, she studied Finance at the Ohio State University and graduated with Summa Cum Laude. Currently, she is a data science intern at Biz2credit focused on credit analysis. As a person with a combined background in finance and data science, she is passionate about Fintech and big data in finance.

Hengda He

Hengda He

Hengda He is a PhD Candidate in Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University. He is working in the lab of Dr. Paul Sajda, studying the spatiotemporal dynamics of the human brain in rapid decision-making with simultaneous EEG-fMRI neuroimaging technique. Before that, he worked with Dr. Ray Razlighi in the Department of Neurology at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, investigating task-evoked negative BOLD response and developing diffeomorphic brain image registration algorithms for fMRI spatial normalization. Hengda earned his M.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering from Columbia University and his B.Eng. in Optoelectronic Information from Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

George Kenefati

George Kenefati

George Kenefati is a current master’s Student studying Biomedical Engineering and specializing in Neural Engineering. He is a first-generation college graduate and a DACA student; He was born in Venezuela and my family is of Syrian descent. He received his bachelor’s degree from The City College of New York in 2020. He is a lifelong artist and studying neural engineering is partly derived from my passion for the arts. After graduating he aspire to work on the border of artificial intelligence and computational neuroscience, improving artificial intelligence with knowledge from neuroscience and vice versa.