Alumni Spotlight

Congratulations to our Berkeley Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) visiting scholar Ariel Ho on her acceptance into Berkeley SkyDeck and Health Tech CoLab Start-up Accelerator Programs!

Ariel Ho is the co-founder of DIAITA (arie.cc). She is currently conducting research on digital health and medical device development through a bioengineering lens. She has over 10 years of clinical nutrition experience in teaching hospitals and previously worked for the International Clinical Diet Association (ICDA) as an advisor and sustainable eating representative. Furthermore, she has participated in the program development of various diet-related apps. Ariel holds a BA in Clinical Nutrition from Chung Shan Medical University, as well as two Master’s degrees, an MSc from University College London and a Master of Veterinary Medicine (MVM) from the National Chung Hsing University.

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? (educational background, hobbies, interests, anything you would like to share with our Berkeley engineering community?)
Hi! My name is Ariel Ho – I am a clinic nutrition professional with over 10 years of hospital experience in clinical treatment. I am also the co-founder of my startup DIAITA. I am also currently a Berkeley Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) visiting scholar at UC Berkeley. In my free time, I enjoy playing basketball (played often in my university days), hanging out with my friends, and playing my keyboard.

What has been your career path from college graduation up to today? And why did you make those educational and career choices?
My journey to where I am today is a result of the opportunities I chose to follow. When I was in university, I applied to graduate school – eventually leading me to learning more about what I was passionate about: biomedicine and biomedical engineering. At UCL in the UK, I obtained my Masters in clinical and public health nutrition, which led to opportunities working in the hospital clinics there. Solving problems in the hospital encouraged me to apply as a Biomedical Visiting Scholar at UC Berkeley – where I hope to find even more opportunities and answers.

How or why did you choose dietician as a career path/area of study?
When I was a child, I had an immune system problem, which was unidentified. My family took me to the hospital, attempting to treat me with traditional Chinese herbal medicinal techniques. Since then, I have been interested in the human body – from the various biological processes inside our bodies to medicine’s and food’s effects on our body to diet’s role on body composition.

What makes you good at your job?

Although my work is primarily focused on illness, I also want to understand the patient beyond their physical situation. I believe one of my greatest attributes is that I am able to put myself in other people’s shoes – understanding their economic, social, and familial situations.

When I worked with different people in different medical backgrounds in the intensive care unit, I was able to think fast on my feet. I provided academia support to doctors under intense situations. I learned to make right decisions in critical times – decisions that were not just good for patients’ health but also good for their whole picture.

Congratulations, we heard your startup has recently entered the National Science Foundation National (NSF)-Winter one!  Can you tell us more about your startup?

Our startup, DIAITA, means way of life in Greek. It’s an app that focuses on preventing illness. Diaita is a digital solution for people who want to create healthy changes to their lifestyles. Diaita uses cognitive behavioral approaches to motivate users to adopt personalized diet plans with the goal of preventing type 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases. This digital solution enables people to gradually change their habits, lose weight and make progress by developing a healthier relationship with food. The app also relies on tried-and-true concepts of psychology. 

Over 38% of American adults have pre-diabetes, making this an urgent issue to tackle. Many illnesses can be prevented through fundamental daily behavior changes. There is currently a large market for diet-related apps, but most focus only on weight loss and calorie tracking rather than on overall health and disease prevention.

Our app is designed to help people reach their individual health goals. Additionally, through personalized dietary and lifestyle advice, we aim to help motivated individuals decrease their risk of chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and certain cancers. There are three primary components to our app: tailored diet, engagement, cognitive behavior change. 

Our target clientele prioritizes maintaining health, staying fit, and preventing disease. Through consulting for various diet app companies, we have learned that engagement, compliance, and a tailored plan are our customers’ primary areas of emphasis. Our team is developing a mobile application that uses established psychological health promotion theories to help individuals achieve and maintain lifestyle behavior changes.

What do you want to achieve?
Prediabetes is our starting point, but it is not the only problem that we are seeking to address. Chronic diseases such as hypertension, kidney disease, and cardiovascular disease are all related to diet. Our vision is to give those who are at high risk of chronic diseases the chance to live healthier, longer lives.

What has been your most challenging experience working on your startup?
Since I have always worked in a hospital, the primary goal is focusing on treating patients first. However, working on my startup, the biggest challenge I had was encountering the large learning curve of running a business – managing a team, communication, forming partnerships, and implementing the business strategy. I am grateful for the opportunity to expand my knowledge on something I am passionate about.

Do you miss anything about being a student?
I stayed in the I-house to experience being a student in the very beginning. I had a wonderful time there. Hanging out with those students makes me feel full of energy. Being a student is a wonderful time. It seems that you have many possibilities to make everything come true. Full of energy not cynics :). It is a symbol of hope and future I saw around the students. Although when I was a student back then, I might have low self-esteem to see that through. Looking back I do miss those energies of corroborate with each other to make a better world, that’s what I found in UC Berkeley students. 

Any caveats, observations or advice that you learned through your career that you would like to share to current students?
Until I made a decision to leave Taiwan for the U.K. and eventually the US, I had always followed what others wanted me to do. But I realized that it is important to follow your heart instead of what other people think – and that’s what brought me to where I am today. Following your heart sounds easy, but when you are faced with reality, financial difficulties, family expectations, sometimes you will wonder if your decision is right or wrong. So my advice is to follow your heart and don’t look back, since you are the one who knows yourself best.

What advice would you give to current students concerning being a leader in not just the tech industry, but also in the classroom and in life?
Anyone can be a leader in your own style, both introvert or extrovert personality. In the hospital, I faced at least 5 deans and 5 presidents of hospitals, and they all had various compliments and complaints . They have their own style of leading people. Sometimes it works, sometimes it’s not. You will find some role models and make you a better lead to make a better team. For me, a leader is not about a person, it’s about a team.

What are some healthy eating tips for college students?

Coming to the US, I immediately noticed that US food is quite salty and sweet compared to snacks and beverages in the UK and Taiwan. Also I found out that California is very health-conscious compared to other states in the US. I would say that reducing intake of these foods is beneficial to not just physical health, but also for mental health, as too much sugar and salt has negative effects on the brain’s functioning.

Another tip I would give college students is to drink more water. This is an extremely important but underrated tip – you should drink about 15.5 cups (3.7 liters) of fluids a day for men, about 11.5 cups (2.7 liters) of fluids a day for women.

Ariel Ho

Ariel Ho is a co-founder of DIAITA (arie.cc), a registered dietician, and a Berkeley Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) visiting scholar at UC Berkeley.

Scarlett as 2022 Taipei Women In Tech Honoree, is a global team builder, visionary leader in Tech/IT industry, and now a visiting scholar in UC Berkeley.  Scarlett is enthusiastic about women empowerment.  She was the Co-Chair of Women In Action ERG club in Dell and initiated Cool Connected Women club with Google, Facebook, Uber. In her spare time, she is passionate about wine tasting. Scarlett won the 1st Place of blind tasting in the Final of Fujian Province and represented the region in China National Competition in 2019. Scarlett lives to the fullest. She is a golfer, certified diver, hiker, and snowboarder.

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? (educational background, hobbies, interests, anything you would like to share with our Berkeley engineering community?)
Hi! My name is Scarlett Ho. I was born and raised in Taiwan and moved to San Francisco just last year. Before joining this Berkeley-Taiwan biomedical fellowship, I was a senior principal product development manager for Dell doing server developments. I was in charge of everything engineering-related; for example, design features, fixing issues – things related to designing a server box from the bottom up. Before Dell, I was a manager in HP also doing servers. I built up a team from scratch. So I think from hiring, coaching, and defining your own road map scope, equipping labs, starting from empty labs, that was quite a unique experience for me.

Other than jobs, I am also very passionate about women empowerment. I was co-chair in Women in Action in Dell and initiated a Cool Connected club with other smart, cool women in the industry.

Before my career, I majored in mechanical engineering at National Taiwan University (NTU) in Taipei, Taiwan. I also have a master’s degree in materials science from National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) in Hsinchu, Taiwan.

These are some brief introductions about myself!

How did your university experiences translate over to the workforce?
I would say that other than the hard skills you learn more in the workforce. The soft skills are learned more in the university, since coordination and communication are all part of unique club experiences. Volunteer and club experiences all develop leadership skills as well. Also, doing team projects and collaborating with classmates in the lab are also helpful.

I wanted to talk about your engineer vs product/program manager path – why did you make those career choices?
When I just graduated, I was debating on whether I should start as an engineer or as a  program manager. I know many engineering students often debate on what position they should take on after graduating. I started as an engineer first, but after one-and-a-half years, I switched to a PM role. My thinking was that I could always start as an engineer and it would be relatively easy to switch to PM, but switching from PM to engineer would take a lot more effort. My advice would be to think of your own preferences, your own characteristics, and what you are really interested in. For example, in the engineering role, you spend most of your time in labs or working in front of a computer. You deal with keeping things consistent in your results. In contrast, as a PM, most of the time you will be in meetings talking with people, dealing with ambiguity, and lots of various situations. Also, there are different types of PMs, such as project managers, product management – which have different responsibilities. Furthermore, different PMs in the software versus engineering industry have different roles.

Can you share your experiences of building a global team in your early career?
When I graduated from university and eventually became an Manager in HP after 3 years, I was able to start a new product line team in Taiwan. It was a big challenge since it was my first time being a manager, but it was also a great opportunity for me. As a leader, I learned and tried things at the same time. It’s not just about managing people – you need to also build your roadmaps with the entire team and collaborate with other teams internationally. The international teams, such as those from Taiwan, US, and Singapore, all provided unique perspectives. I think it is important to have varieties within the team in order to come up with the best solutions.

How would you describe your leadership style?
I would say that I like to trust my team, and guide my team through the big picture, instead of micromanagement. Since I would describe myself as transparent, I appreciate transparency from my team members as well.

I would also like to think that I am a supportive manager. If the team makes a solid decision based on data and facts, I will support the decision.

I definitely think that leadership styles vary from person to person since we all have different personalities. Introverts versus extroverts tend to lead people differently. How would you describe yourself – as more of an introvert or extrovert?
I would say that I am 50/50. Although I like to interact and talk with people, I also enjoy my time alone.

What has been your most challenging experience in your career?
My biggest challenge came when it was the first time being a manager over my team. There were many questions I needed to figure out: how do you earn trust from other people who have more seniority and experience than you, how do you build your credibility when you are a first-timer?

What I learned from this challenge is that you should pay more attention to people, instead of just focusing on doing things right.  When I first started in the PM role, I was still more “engineering-brained” – data-driven, logical, analytical. Gradually, I learned how to build trust with people who have more seniority than myself by giving them more flexibility to perform their roles since they don’t need as much guidance. I would get them on board to assist me with guiding the other team members and mentor the junior members.

You were Co-Chair or Women In Action club and initiated Cool Connected Women; can you share more about that?
The platforms Women in Action and Cool Connected Women are for building a network and providing a place for women to learn and develop their skills. I’m interested in women empowerment because from my background as a mechanical engineer, there are few girls there; also, in the tech industry, it can be hard as one of the sole women in the office. I was one of the only women in my team. Having these platforms enables us to not just share with each other, but also have more friends in the tech industry and excel. Diversity is a big part of these clubs as well.

The difference between Women in Action club and Cool Connected Women is that Cool Connected Women is more industrialized, as we collaborate with big tech companies such as Google, Uber, and Facebook in Taiwan.

What is your ultimate career goal?
My goal would be to continue building up my influence level because I think that the broader influence level you have, the more people you can learn from and help with. 

I also want to expand the women empowerment platforms I mentioned earlier. Sharing career paths and experiences with others definitely makes it easier as a woman in the tech industry.

Any caveats, observations or advice that you learned through your career that you would like to share to current students?ble thing you learned in Bioengineering at Berkeley?
Especially to engineering students, I encourage you to be proactive in your early career. As a senior in the tech industry, I now know that people are the key to your success. Taking care of team members is crucial to success.

Also, don’t forget to be authentic to everyone – those around you and yourself.

Personally, I have a hard time balancing everything at times. What would your advice be on that?
When it comes to balance, I think it’s important to first consider your goals and priorities – is it family, academics, work, etc.? After you clarify those priorities, then it becomes easier to utilize your time and resources. Also, keep in mind that these priorities will change from time to time – depending on the different stages in your life.

Do you miss anything about being a student?
Honestly, not that much!

I did have a good time in school with friends and classmates – I have enjoyed every stage of my life, and that included my time in university. Because of this, I don’t feel like I need to revisit the past. I always look forward to the future.

What keeps you enthusiastic about your work?
Honor and respect are very important to me, so I always strive to pursue that in my work, at school, and with my relationships with people. I like to recognize and encourage people at work, whether it be for achievement or for their hard work.

Can you tell me more about how you became a Visiting Scholar of the Berkeley-Taiwan-Biomedical Fellowship?
I’m interested in biomedical because my family is in the business, so I am interested in the bioengineering and biomedical industry. I came to the States to learn more about the business side of biomedical engineering. The Bay Area is well known for startups and the ecosystem , so Berkeley was a perfect fit for pursuing that.priorities will change from time to time – depending on the different stages in your life.

Lastly, can you go more into the wine blind taste testing competition?
Yes! So I am a big fan of wine tasting. When I was in Taiwan, my friends and I enjoyed tasting wine together. The engineering side of me comes into play here, as I always asked questions about the wine: where did the wine come from, what variety the wine was, etc. A couple of friends and I went to wine tasting training so that we could differentiate between different varieties, regions, and vintages, as well as to tell which characteristics are of which wines. 

In 2019, we joined the Final Wine Tasting Competition in Guangzhou, China. Luckily, we won first place. We also represented the city to join Final Competition in Shanghai.

Now, I still enjoy wine tasting, but I probably forgot a lot of the tasting techniques. I need to practice more!

Scarlett Ho

Scarlett is a 2022 Taipei Women In Tech Honoree, a global team builder, visionary leader in Tech/IT industry, and now a visiting scholar in UC Berkeley. 

“Failing once doesn’t mean you’ll fail forever, and you can simply restart and work again.”

Dr. Jowy Tani is the CEO of Taipei Medical University Biomed Accelerator, Taiwan’s first university-based biomedical startup accelerator. He was an alumni of the Berkeley-Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) Fellowship and Stanford Biodesign Global Faculty Program. He has extensive experience in architecting biomedical innovation ecosystems, leading medical innovation projects, and coaching Medtech strategies for startups. As a neurologist-innovator, Dr. Tani has in-depth expertise in dementia, sleep medicine, and electro neurophysiology.

He is also serving as the Deputy Secretary-General of Taiwan Neurological Society, Director of Wan Fang Hospital Sleep Medicine Center, Deputy Director of Wan Fang Hospital Biomed Innovation Center, Deputy CEO of Taipei Medical University Biodesign Center, and Assistant Professor of Neurology at Taipei Medical University.

Can You Tell Us a Little Bit about Yourself and the Berkeley-Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) Fellowship? (Educational background, hobbies, interests, anything you would like to share with our Berkeley engineering community?)
As a neurologist in an academic medical center, I had the opportunity to get involved in a few clinical studies involving innovative medical devices. It was during these experiences I came to realize that Taiwan had an excellent environment for clinical study, and that we could create a lot of value by developing innovative medical devices and then validating it in Taiwan’s clinical environment. I eventually applied to the Berkeley-Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) fellowship program, an entrepreneurial fellowship with a focus on medical devices jointly hosted by UC Berkeley College of Engineering and Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan.

What has been your career path from college graduation up to today? And what inspired these educational and career choices?
I went straight into neurology residency training after medical school because I am fascinated by how the brain functions. During my residency training, I saw a lot of patients suffering from dementia and cognitive impairments. These patients suffered a lot in their daily lives because problems in the brain prevented them from carrying out many essential daily functions. Although scientists had tried hard to develop drugs that might improve the brain function of these patients, the breakthroughs are hard to come by. I began to focus on dementia and cognitive impairments after I finished the residency training, to explore potential Medtech solutions for the patients. 

How or why did you choose biomedical engineering as a career path/area of study?
As a physician-innovator, one could try either a biopharma approach or a biomedical engineering approach to solve a health problem. While many important health problems had been solved by the biopharma approach, developing a biopharma solution generally takes a long time, up to 10-15 years.

On the other hand, developing a solution with the biomedical engineering approach takes much less time. A medical device could be brought to market in 3-5 years. When a medical device working not as intended, innovators could often change its design to make it work. The biomedical engineering approach is more interesting to me as a young physician-innovator who loves to “make things work”, it also fits more of my personality too.

How was your experience with the Berkeley-Taiwan Biomedical Fellowship program?
Coming to Berkeley was a wonderful experience. Berkeley is a very vibrant community where we learned a lot of things and made many friends. Berkeley campus is also a very open-minded environment that encourages growth and learning. I was surprised by how open people are to innovation.

Being a physician-innovator focusing on patients with dementia and cognitive impairment, I have been working on a cognitive prosthesis device that uses artificial intelligence to help these patients overcome their cognitive impairments. It would help the patients utilize the part of the brain with preserved function to compensate for the part of the brain with impairment, significantly improving their quality of life. During the BTB Fellowship, I was able to attend UC Berkeley courses, interact with world-renowned EECS faculties, and learn machine learning techniques essential for the prototyping process.

As a BTB fellow, I was fortunate to have the valuable opportunity to work in Berkeley Skydeck, the UC Berkeley-sponsored startup accelerator. During my time at Skydeck, I learned about how Silicon Valley startups work together with accelerators and venture capitals in an innovation ecosystem. As the nexus of Berkeley’s innovation ecosystem, Skydeck provided funding, programs, and training opportunities to students and members of the academic community and I believe that was what Taiwan lacked.

What was your journey like to become the CEO of Taipei Medical University Biomed Accelerator? 
When I came back to Taiwan after I finished my BTB fellowship in 2018, Taiwan had a young biomedical innovation community. Taiwan had an excellent healthcare system and established tech industry, but new biomedical startups were often trapped in the so-called valley of death; they often had an early-stage product but had difficulty entering the market. We from Taipei Medical University realized that we need a biomedical accelerator that could help startups get through the valley of death.

There were very few faculties and physicians in Taiwan familiar with the concept of university-based accelerator and university-based innovation ecosystem at that time, so the leadership of Taipei Medical University discussed with me the possibility of establishing a university-based biomedical accelerator in Taipei Medical University. With the support of President Chien-Huang Lin, Vice President Chieh-Hsi Wu, Business Development Dean Mao-Chun Lin, our Deputy CEO Sharon Yi, and our Operation Manager Sebastian Ku, we then founded the Taipei Medical University Biomed Accelerator.

There was no other university-based Biomed Accelerator in Taiwan at that time, so we were the first ones to enter this field. As a pioneer, we had to think of everything and prepared for the risk involved. We had to think about how do we gain the support of stakeholders, including partners within and outside our university? How do we recruit the startups? How do we invest in startups? How do we match the startups with their mentors? How do we improve the startup’s access to resources and international markets? How would we hold demo days? 

I would say our startups and partners are the keys to our accelerator’s modest success. I am extremely grateful for the trust and continuous support from our partners including BE Health Ventures, UCSF Rosenman Institute, Premo Partners/Japan Biodesign, AstraZeneca, and NBRP.  I would also thank Taipei Medical University alumni and friends that have generously supported the accelerator.

What makes you good at your job?
I think that in order to be a successful CEO of a biomedical accelerator, you have to have a lot of interdisciplinary knowledge. For example, if you are good at the investment process, but you know nothing about engineering or medicine, then you may have some bias while doing investments. Experiences in finance, engineering, and medicine are very helpful for the job.

A good way to accumulate know-how in these fields is through networking with professionals in the respective fields. Learn from their knowledge and experiences instead of doing everything yourself.

What is your ultimate career goal?
I wish that one day we could have a world-class biomedical accelerator that can help international startups enter the Asian market, and one that can help startups in Taiwan and Asia access the global market. I think that good mentoring alongside timely and well-thought-out investment really helps startups from the ground up. Also, a lot of biomedical startups struggle with getting to patients and to doctors, and I wish to bridge between the two groups. My ultimate aim is to help Taiwanese startups succeed at a global level and see the regional biomedical innovation ecosystem flourish.

What is challenging about your work? And what keeps you enthusiastic about your work despite the challenges?
Building any type of accelerator is hard, and there are definitely a lot of frustrating moments promoting innovation outside of Silicon Valley. Not all people are comfortable with innovation and disruptive technologies, even more so in the healthcare field, where people tend to be conservative for the sake of patient safety. Our team often have to spend significant effort familiarizing people with the benefits of innovation before they would be a supporter of changes. Nevertheless, our team grows by the day and it is comforting to know that I’m with a crowd of amazing and talented people. Furthermore, knowing that people and their projects will benefit from my accelerator team keeps me going. It is also very gratifying to see the startups that we helped achieve their milestones.

What advice do you have for students interested in running their own start up?
When I was a college student, I couldn’t appreciate all the resources that I had. When you are a student, you have more opportunities to pick yourself up and try again, even if you fail the first few times. Also, being a student, you have the opportunity to network within the rich academic community around you, don’t miss that out!

What was the most valuable thing you learned in Bioengineering at Berkeley?
Before I came to Berkeley, as a physician, I had the mindset that I had to be perfect and refuse to fail in anything that I do. But Berkeley changed that mindset. It taught me how to prototype fast, fail fast, and fail early. It taught me that I didn’t need to be scared of failure. Failing once doesn’t mean you’ll fail forever, and you can simply restart and work again. This mindset changed my perspective on how I view the world; that failure wasn’t always bad, as long as you try again. If I did not have this experience, I wouldn’t have built the accelerator. Berkeley really molded how I grew and learned as an individual. 

Any caveats, observations or advice that you learned through your career that you would like to share to current students?
During my time at Berkeley, one of the experiences that impacted me most was my Skydeck experience. I would recommend the students utilize the opportunities that Skydeck offers while you are in Berkeley. I benefited a lot through the mentorship opportunities I received through Skydeck. I also learned a lot from classes, but the entrepreneurship class at Haas School of Business was the most memorable course for me. I would also recommend the Product Management course from EECS and the School of Information.

Echoing my earlier statement, if you have something in mind, just do it and do not hesitate. People had been asking me whether they are at the right time to apply for the BTB Fellowship. My answer would be that if you are in Taiwan interested in a future in biomedical innovation, just do it as soon as you have the chance to do so!

Dr. Jowy Tani

Dr. Jowy Tani was an alumni of the Berkeley-Taiwan Biomedical (BTB) Fellowship, where he came to study startups in Silicon Valley. He is currently back in Taiwan and the CEO of Taipei Medical University Biomed Accelerator.

A PhD program is not really a test, it challenges how you communicate with people, how you manage your time, and how you plan your experiments. It is a really comprehensive process.

Can You Tell Us a Little Bit About Yourself? 

I am now a second year PhD student in Materials Science and Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). My undergraduate schooling was in China at ShanghaiTech University. Currently, my research focus at CMU is on biosensors and material-neuronal interfaces. But interestingly enough, my background in China and at UC Berkeley was mainly in the areas of computational engineering/sciences. I have switched to the experimental side of research for my PhD because that area attracts me more.

For my personal life, the PhD life is really busy. I try to make an effort to find some time for myself. Pittsburg has a lot of good restaurants that I can go to, and I also like cooking and baking cakes at home when I have time. 

What inspired you to choose the major that you are in? What still excites you about your major?

When we talk about “Materials Science and Engineering”, it is really a broad map, which really includes so many attractive areas. For example, CMU has a strong background in metallic materials because Pittsburgh is well-known as “the city of Steel”, and the tie between materials and artificial intelligence is tight and mind blowing. Meanwhile, UC Berkeley has many pioneer researchers on electrochemistry, whose state-of-art works are really fascinating as well. This is why this major is interesting – you will have many choices! It is also a combination of many different majors such as chemistry, physics, biology and computer science. I changed my research interest from computational/simulation to experimental. This does not mean that I do not like computational material, I want to explore more opportunities in this major.

What prompted you to come to UC Berkeley and be a member of the GLOBE family?

It was my honor to study as an exchange student at UC Berkeley for one year. The reason why I chose Berkeley is because I had the education background in China, but I haven’t experienced American education at the college level, like how the courses are set up, what is the teaching style, how the students’ life is like here. UC Berkeley is a top school in engineering, which is an outstanding place for exploring the new culture, that is why I applied for it. 

What were your experiences at UC Berkeley and being a part of GLOBE?

It was really very different from ShanghaiTech. I would talk about the courses first. I selected the computer science course here: CS 61A intro to programming, which is outside of my major in materials science and engineering. I really learned a lot from this class. It changed my mind about coding and helped me build up interest in computer science and enhanced my programming skills. In CS 61A, l do not feel stressed out with coding as I used to feel, since the course is designed to ramp up and all the teaching assistants were very welcoming and helpful. There was even one-on-one help in the class to help students overcome challenges in coding. It really inspires me and changed my mind about teaching and learning. It was not just gaining knowledge in the class, it was an exploration and experiencing a journey.

From the research perspective, I was working with Dr. Matthew Sherburne on research. I worked on kinetic modeling for catalytic reactions. It was a collaboration between UC Berkeley, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), and National University of Singapore (NUS). The research from CNRS focused on experimental parts, while UC Berkeley and NUS focused on the computational parts. Dr. Sherburne gave me a lot of good advice and suggested many useful textbooks and papers to start the project. It inspired me a lot since I learned that it was possible to learn from scratch and it is a really valuable memory. 

UC Berkeley is a really really large school compared with CMU. When I first came to Berkeley, I was surprised  about the campus size. One funny memory is that I remember there were dogs and pets to help reduce stress at Sather Gate. I thought the dogs were really cute!  There were many clubs and activities that you can be involved in. I think this was something that is very appealing about Berkeley.

Why did you decide to go to graduate school instead of the industry? How and when did you decide? Do you think you should decide earlier? Why or why not?

I decided to go to graduate school as soon as I got into undergraduate and majored in Materials Science and Engineering. Some people might have a very clear idea about their path in highschool or even earlier. Those folks are really lucky, but I think it is not too late to decide later in college. 

Also, I think I need to learn more and experience more before I can go into industry. I feel like if I go straight into industry after undergraduate, then I will be limited by the nature of work I am able to do and the autonomy I have in choosing and doing my projects. That is not my ultimate goal for my career. My goal is that I want to learn more and help myself to form my own projects and lead my own group in the future. 

What is your ultimate career goal?

My ultimate career goal is to focus on healthcare areas where I can solve some real-world problems, such as the treatment of Parkinson’s disease. The number of elderly is growing as society’s population ages. Therefore, I want to spend more time exploring and helping solve health-related issues. In addition, I think it is really interesting to work in an area where my projects can help many people. 

What keeps you enthusiastic about your work?

When I know other people can benefit from my work, I feel very happy. I will try to do what I can to help others. Also, I like learning new things and new knowledge. Whenever I figure out the model and how the experiment works, I will feel very proud of myself. 

How many recommendations do grad schools need for application? Who are the best people to write these recommendations?

I think normally, there will be 3 letters required. I got two letters from my advisors in ShanghaiTech from Dr. Lin and Dr. Lee, and one letter from my advisor, Dr. Sherburne at UC Berkeley. There was an opportunity where I could receive a letter from a “big name” professor whom I did a summer project with in Berkeley. However, I did not end up asking for it because I think it is more persuasive to have the people who really know you to write your letters. My advice is to find your advisors who know you the best and ask them to write the letters. It seems really fantastic to get letters from big name professors, but they might not know you very well. Also, it will be great if each of your letters will cover your different aspects, like research performance, course performance, and even volunteering performance. 

Is it okay to have imperfect grades when applying to grad school?

Yeah, definitely. My GPA was okay, but not perfect. The key point is knowing your own strength. My strength was that I had a lot of undergraduate research experiences, so I could prove that I had problem-solving skills and self-learning skills. A perfect GPA cannot show how well your research skills are or that you were a good researcher. I would like to say that GPA is important, but it  is not only one way to evaluate a student. Finding what makes you special and highlights those strengths will be really helpful in application.

Any personal suggestions that you want to share given your application experience? How to be more competitive as an applicant retrospectively?

I think one really important thing is to write down all the details of all the things you have experienced, and modify it for each application. I wrote really detailed descriptions of every research and every social experience. For my application, I may not use all of these experiences, but I can have these to pick and choose from. Second, have different application materials for different schools. Every school has different research topics they are really specialized in. I recommend you to contact the professor of interest as early as possible and proactively build up the connection. Active students are always welcomed!