About
Hi! I'm a PhD candidate in Computer Science at Columbia University, fortunate to be advised by Professor Steven Feiner in the Computer Graphics and User Interfaces (CGUI) Lab and part of the Columbia HCI group.
As an M.S. student I also worked with Professor Junfeng Yang. Before Columbia, I received a B.S. in Computer Science, Mathematics, and Cognitive Science from Rutgers University.
News
Research
My research centers on XR for teleoperation and human-robot interaction and on 3D immersive reconstruction with Gaussian splatting. Recent threads:
- XR teleoperation and human-robot interaction — bimanual XR authoring of assembly hierarchies for robot teleoperation (IEEE VR'26) and relative 6DoF task guidance (ISMAR'25).
- 3D immersive reconstruction with Gaussian splatting — fast digitization of real objects into reality-linked, splatted proxies (IEEE VR'26).
- Proxies for selection and manipulation in XR — permanent proxies for bimanual interaction (IEEE VR'25).
Selected Publications
Awards
Teaching & Service
COMS 6173: VR and AR Seminar — Head TA (Fall 2025)
COMS 4172: 3DUI and AR — Head TA (Spring 2024)
COMS 4771: Machine Learning — TA (Summer 2021, Fall 2021)
CHI 2025, VRST 2024, ISMAR 2024, CHI 2024
Miscellaneous
When not working on research, I like to ski, climb, and play volleyball. I also enjoy fantasy, sci-fi, and literary fiction. Some of my favorites are Piranesi (Susanna Clarke), The Last Samurai (Helen DeWitt), and The Mountain in the Sea (Ray Nayler).
I keep a running, ranked list of the fiction and media I love at tracker.benjyang.com.