Zuchen Li | University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

About Me

I am an undergraduate student at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, majoring in Honors Data Science & Statistics with a minor in History. Previously, I studied Statistics & Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. My research interests span generative AI, privacy-aware machine learning, and human-computer interaction.

Research Interests

Generative AI: music and audio generation, human-GenAI interaction
Privacy & Security: geolocation attack/defense with diffusion models and VLMs
Statistical Machine Learning: dimension reduction, Bayesian methods, wearable data analysis
Climate Science: aerosol-cloud interactions, statistical modeling

Experience

Generative AI for Music and Audio, UMich — Research Assistant, Oct 2025 – Present
Building a universal optical music recognition framework for visually complex notations; exploring real-time human–GenAI interaction for controllable music generation.
Ambient Intelligence Lab, UMich — Research Assistant, Oct 2025 – Present
Developing privacy-driven geolocation attack and defense frameworks using diffusion models and VLMs; designing intelligent IoT sensing systems with Moiré-pattern optical sensors.
Energy Distance Dimension Reduction, UMich — URPS, Jan 2025 – Present
Applying sufficient dimension reduction to multilevel wearable data from bone marrow transplant patients; re-implementing SDR algorithms in JAX with 7,000× speedup.
Lab of Atmospheric and Earth System Sciences, Nanjing University — Summer Research Intern, May – Aug 2024
Applied statistical machine learning to study aerosol-cloud interactions and improved simulations of aerosol optical properties and climate effects.
E2-E Lab, UIUC — Undergraduate Research Assistant, Aug 2023 – May 2024
Conducted airflow experiments with PIV data processing and CFD simulations to analyze particle–airflow interactions in complex 3D geometries.

Interests & Activities

Michigan Daily: News reporter, photographer, and videographer — producing multimedia content including short-form videos and digital features.
ISTORM (UIUC): Member of the Illinois Student Organization of Meteorology, the student chapter of the American Meteorological Society, focused on severe and hazardous weather forecasting.
History: Passionate about history with a minor in the subject, exploring how past events shape our understanding of the present.
Meteorology: A lifelong fascination with weather and atmospheric science, from storm chasing to climate modeling.