Yen-Chia Hsu

Yen-Chia Hsu is an Assistant Professor at the Informatics Institute, University of Amsterdam, where they teach courses in Information Visualization and Data Science. Previously, they served as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Sustainable Design Engineering, Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, TU Delft, and as a Project Scientist in the CREATE Lab at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). Their academic journey reflects a unique interdisciplinary background bridging computer science and architectural design.

Dr. Hsu earned their Ph.D. degree in Robotics in 2018 from the Robotics Institute at CMU, where they conducted research on using technology to empower local citizens and communities. Prior to that, they received their Master's degree in tangible interaction design in 2012 from the School of Architecture at CMU, where they studied and built prototypes of interactive robots and wearable devices. Before CMU, they earned a dual Bachelor's degree in both architecture and computer science in 2010 at National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan.

Dr. Hsu is a computer scientist with an architectural design background whose research focuses on Community-Empowered Artificial Intelligence (AI), where they co-design, implement, deploy, and evaluate interactive AI systems that empower communities, especially in addressing environmental and social issues. Their work spans both social and technical aspects of community engagement with technology. On the social side, they have proposed an alternative framework called Community Citizen Science (CCS), which extends traditional citizen science methods to a hyper-local scale, emphasizing continued community engagement after technology interventions. On the technical side, they investigate human feedback in AI pipelines and algorithms that enable machine learning models to incorporate different types of human input.

Dr. Hsu's scholarly output demonstrates a consistent focus on applying computer vision, machine learning, and data science to environmental monitoring and community empowerment. Their recent work shows an evolution from developing specific tools for pollution monitoring toward more comprehensive frameworks for community engagement with AI systems. A notable trend is the increasing emphasis on empathy-centered design and policy implications of community-driven data collection systems. Their research bridges the gap between technical innovation and social impact, particularly in the domains of air quality monitoring and environmental justice.

• Outstanding Student Academic Achievement (2005, 2006, 2007) from Department of Architecture, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan
• Third Prize, National Country House Design Competition (2008) from Ministry of the Interior, Taiwan
• Best New Artist, The National Golden Award for Architecture (2009), Taiwan
• Webby People's Voice Award, Best Use of Video or Moving Image (2014)
• Best Paper Honorable Mention Award (Top 5%) at ACM CHI Conference (2017)
• Best Paper Honorable Mention Award (Top 2.5%) at ACM IUI Conference (2019)
• Prize for Community Collaboration, The Constellation Prize (2020)

Dr. Hsu has been actively involved in numerous research projects that bridge academia and community action. Their work on the Smell Pittsburgh platform, which allows citizens to report pollution odors to regulators, has been particularly influential in environmental advocacy. They have collaborated with organizations including ACCAN, PennEnvironment, GASP, Sierra Club, ROCIS, Blue Lens, LLC, PennFuture, Clean Water Action, and Clean Air Council. Their research has received support from the Heinz Endowments and has been featured in TIME, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, PC Magazine, and other media outlets. Dr. Hsu also maintains an active open-source presence, with several tools and datasets released to support community-driven environmental monitoring.

Dr. Hsu leads projects that focus on developing tools for community engagement at scale, including COCTEAU, an empathy-based tool for decision-making, and Project RISE, which recognizes industrial smoke emissions. Their work connects with the Multimedia Analytics Lab Amsterdam, where they contribute to data science education and research. Their approach emphasizes co-creation with communities rather than top-down technology deployment, positioning them at the forefront of human-centered AI research with real-world social impact.