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An undergraduate computer science student at Drexel University with interests in mathematics, data structures, machine learning, data science, & blockchains.


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About

Vivek is an undergraduate junior at Drexel University pursuing a BS in Computer Science with prospected minors in Mathematics and Data Science. Vivek is extremely passionate about his interests in mathematics, data science, machine learning, and blockchains. As a result, he plans to pursue concentrations like - Artificial Intelligence, Computer Vision, Computer Networks and Security, & Computing Systems (OS & Concurrent Programming).

In addition to the solid academic record, Vivek has also been actively working as a researcher, campus organizations leader, teaching assistant, and part-time intern at on-campus startups. For example, he served as a teaching assistant for the Advanced Programming Techniques (CS 265) class in Winter 2020, and is current serving as a vice-president for the Data Structures and Algorithms Club. He is also a member of Drexel Data Science Group and Drexel Google Developers Student Club. More information about his projects, skills, experiences, and more can be found on his personal website (see below) and LinkedIn profile.

Vivek recently finished working on a research project that he had initiated while attending an engineering exchange program at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in Fall 2019. He worked with multiple professor (s) and PhD student (s) to solve the data pollution and model poisoning attacks associated with the federated learning system. On completion of the project, he co-authored a conference paper which is submitted to NeurIPS 2020.

Currently, Vivek is active as a machine learning researcher at the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad. Over there, he is leading a project to build and test a production-ready decentralized federated learning system. Additionally, he is also actively working as a machine learning researcher at the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology to design, prove, and implement a computational offloading protocol for edge-device training of the DL models. Finally, he is also working as a part-time machine learning engineer with Olak, a startup based in Silicon Valley, to build and deploy an Autofill Engine using novel deep learning architectures.





Education

  Drexel University
  • BS in Computer Science
  • Awards: Founder's Scholarship, Drexel Grant
  • Dean's List (GPA - 3.93)
  • Clubs & Organizations:
    • Drexel Algorithms & Data Structures(Vice-Pres)
    • Data Science & Text Processing Working Group(Member)
    • Drexel Google Developers Student Club(Member)
  • Teaching Assitant:
    • CS265(Advanced Programming Techniques) - Winter 2020
  • 2018 - 2023
  Hong Kong Univ of Sci. and Tech.
  • Undergraduate Engineering Exchange and Research Program
  • Courses: Systems Architecture, Discrete Math, Probability
  • Research: FedClean: A Decentralized Defence Mechanism Against Model Poisoning Attacks in the federated learning systems(more details in projects section).
  • Diversity and Financial Need Scholarship (1250 USD)
  • September 1, 2019 - January 3, 2020 (Fall Semester)
  Stanford University
  • Pre-Collegiate Summer Institutes
  • Course - Knot Theory
  • Full-Ride Scholar
  • June 18, 2016 -- July 8, 2016




Skills

Prog. Languages

Tools

Frameworks

Applications

Operating Systems





Experiences

  PowerPlay

Position: Founder, Lead Developer
Visit: Promotional Website (being developed)
Details: Concept/Introduction

  • Leading efforts to build a social-networking solution to connect, rank, and promote non-professional cricket-playing community in India
  • Individually built the initial prototype of the product using React Native, Django, MySQL, RealmDB, Firebase Auth, and Google Cloud engine
  • Supervising a team of developers with the aim of releasing the initial version in mid-September.

July 2020 - Present

  Systems & Media Lab @ HKUST

Position: Machine Learning Researcher
Supervisor:Dr. Dimitris Chatzopoulos (HKUST)
Visit: SymLab Homepage
Project: SplitNN: A Computational Offloading Protocol for On-Device DL Training

  • Tweaked the backpropagation algorithm to train sensitive layers of a DL model on the client and computationally intensive layers on the server
  • Simulated the new algorithm using PyTorch and obtained benchmark results on ANN’s and CNN’s without exposing the client data or labels
  • Building a mobile app to test validity of the system in practical scenario and measure the associated hardware and communication cost

June 2020 - Present


Machine Learning Lab @ IIIT,IND

Position: Machine Learning Researcher
Supervisor(s):Dr. Sujit Gujar (IIIT) & Dr. Dimitris Chatzopoulos (HKUST)
Visit: Machine Learning Laboratory Homepage
Project: FedML: A Decentralized Federated Learning Framework for Real Client Devices

  • Working as a sole engineer and primary lead to design and build a decentralized federated learning system which will be ready for production
  • Plan to optimize the system for restricted hardware on real client devices (mobile phones) to ensure practical usability of the system
  • Goal is to provide a framework that can be used by broader public to administer and participate in the federated training process
  • More details about the project to follow shortly

April 2020 - Present

  Olak,Inc.

Position: Machine Learning Research Engineer
Visit: Official Website
View: Referene Letter

  • Designed and implemented a deep learning pipeline to achieve ~95% accuracy for an Autofill extension
  • Processed and organized the raw webpage (HTML) data to generate contextual embeddings and later feed it to the classification model
  • Developed and tested multiple time series, seq2seq, transformer-based models to perform multi-class classification on imbalanced text data
  • Optimized the system, pruned the model, and deployed it in-browser (serverless) as a Chrome extension
  • Improved the existing rule-based Autofill performance by ~20%
  • Working on novel data augmentation techniques to improve the model performance on edge cases and make it extensible to broader use cases

March 2020 - Present


  Drexel University

Teaching Assistant:

Clubs & Organizations:

  • Drexel Algorithms & Data Structures(Vice-President)
  • Drexel Data Science & Text Processing Working Group(Member)
  • Drexel Google Students Deeloipers Club(Member)

Research Positions:

  • Applications of Recurrent Neural Network (Dr. Anup Das): Spring 2019

January 2020 - Present

  Systems & Media Lab @ HKUST

Position: Machine Learning Researcher
Supervisor(s):Dr. Pan Hui & Dr. Dimitris Chatzopoulos
Visit: SymLab Homepage
Project: FedClean: A Decentralized Defence Mechanism Against Parameter Poisoning Attacks in Federated Learning Systems

  • Implemented a federated learning system using Python, PyTorch, PySyft for the CIFAR-10 and MNIST dataset.
  • Programmed various synthetic data pollution attacks to analyze the performance degradation in the system.
  • Built a defence mechanism to protect the system from the previously launched data pollution attacks and analyzed the performance improvement.
  • Developed multiple APIs on blockchains (smart contracts) and PyTorch that can be used by other researchers using the CLI.
  • Responsible for the machine learning and blockchain engineering of the entire project being a sole engineer on the team.
  • Co-authored a conference paper submitted to NeurIPS 2020.

August 2019 - May 2020


  Winfo Solutions

Position: Technology Summer Intern

  • Built a text-based PDF scraper only using Python and Regular Expressions. Explored the OCR scraper building process
  • Trained towards Robotics Process Automation (RPA) using UiPath under a senior mentor.
  • Offered to continue working as a part-time remote intern after completion of the summer internship

July 2019 - August 2019

  CurbStyle Inc.

Position: Full-Stack Developer

  • Volunteered to build an interface that helps buskers to connect and find opportunities in Philadelphia
  • Developed a system with features like signup, login authentication, buskers profile, infinites scroll, image uploads, and payments.
  • Implemented the secure and interactive user interface using React JS and database using the Firebase
  • Prototyped a system for the users and buskers to send and receive payments using various medium

April 2019 - June 2019





Projects and Research

What To-Do

 Role : Full Stack Developer
 Location: Drexel University (Class Project)
 Duration : March, 2020
 Skills : Web Development, Google Cloud, MySQL, NodeJS

  • Hosted a MySQL database on Google Cloud for collaborative usage by the team members
  • Implemented login authentication (with password encryption and sessions support) using NodeJS and MySQL database
  • Deployed a machine learning algorithm using Tensorflow.js and pre-trained Google's document-to-vector embedding model for recommending personalized tasks based on the available history
  • Optimized the website performance using advanced tools like browser caching, cookies, and sessions support
  • Worked on NodeJS, Express, MySQL backend to display the to-do tasks for logged-in users with intuitive UI and added functionality
View Project
Tweeting for Love

 Role : Full-Stack Developer
 Location : Drexel University (Hackathon Project)
 Duration: March 2020 (24 hours)
 Skills: Machine Learning, Backend Development, Android Studio, Java

  • Developed a Tinder-like platform that uses the social relationships (followers of followers) from Twitter to make match recommendations
  • Worked with Twitter4J (Java wrapper for Twitter API) to enable Twitter login authentication and extract followers data from Twitter
  • Implemented a LSTM deep learning model to predict gender of the users based on names as Twitter didn't disclose that data
View Project
Machine Learning Projects & Algorithms

 Role : Individual Project
 Duration: October, 2019 - Present
 Skills: Machine Learning, Python, Mathematics, Multiple Python libraries, Git

  • Participating in various online competitions launched by Kaggle, DataCamp, DrivenData to hone my practical machine learning engineering skills
  • Performing mathematical analysis, feature engineering, and developing various models using Python-based machine learning tools
  • Maintaining an open-source Git repository to publish my mathematical intuition, thought process, code, and final results so it can be used by others
View Project
HKUST Schedule Crawler

 Location : Hong Kong Uni. Of Sci And Technology (HKUST)
 Duration : August, 2019 (4 hours)
 Skills : Python, Web Scraping, OOP, BeautifulSoup

  • Implemented a web crawler in Python that takes term and class name as an input and outputs the details
  • Used BeautifulSoup for scraping the relevant data from HKUST course details page.
  • Handled all the input errors and edge cases and asked various students to test it as well so the code is ready for production.
  • Shared the final code with HKUST official app development team to use it in production.
  • Completed the final product (with edge case testing) in approximately 4 hours.
View Project
Flu-Finder : Freshman Design Project

 Role : Full-Stack Developer
 Duration: Jan, 2019 - June, 2019
 Skills: HTML5, JavaScript, CSS, Bootstrap4, Google Maps API, Firebase

  • Designed a web-interface to keep a track of influenza cases and display relevant statistics for the users in Pennsylvania region.
  • Hosted the complete website using Firebase CLI tools
  • Implemented a system to take user-inputs, store the data using Firebase, and process the data to obtain flu-statistics for the specific regions (zipcode based).
  • Developed an extremely secure signup and login authentication using Firebase to avoid the collection of garbage users.
  • Displayed the obtained flu-statistics for the relevant locations on a color-coded map using Google Maps API
View Project
Research : Application of Recurrent Neural Network

 Supervising Faculty : Dr. Anup Das
 Duration: May, 2019 - June, 2019
 Skills: Machine Learning, Python3, Tensorflow, Keras

  • Collaborating with two other developers to research on a topic involving the applications of recurrent neural networks (Can't disclose the exact topic because of non-disclosure agreement).
  • Using tools like Tensorflow, Keras, and Python to build models and various other tools to process and clean the raw data (can't disclose it too).
Cubesat Interplanetary Optical Navigation

 Role : Developer
 Event: ProfHacks 2019 (Rowan University Annual Hackathon)
 Skills: HTML5, JavaScript, CSS, Bootstrap, FileZilla, Python

  • Individually designed, developed, and hosted a web-interface the complete website for the project overnight
  • Derived the Math algorithm for the distance calculation of the cubesat from unknown planetary object.
Retrocade : Arcade Gaming on cardboard

 Role : Developer
 Event: DragonHacks 2019 (Drexel University Annual Hackathon)
 Award: Best IoT Hack
 Skills: Linux, C++, Arduino (teammates), Python

 Hardware:
Included soldering and multiplexing of LEDs on the cardboard, which will act as a screen and than programming the arduino to control those LEDs

 Software:

  • Programming the game using Python which can be played using 4 inpus (standard joystick inputs)
  • These games are eventually linked to the DragonBoard 410C and arduino to be played on the cardboard screen
  • For the hackathon, we were able to come up with Apple Catcher, but we have the code ready for games like Pong and Snake which we will add later (we were unable to add it this time because arduino ran out of memory, hence we are planning to use a series of arduino's)
View Project
Text-Based Version of Lunar Lander

 Role : Individual Developer
 Duration: November, 2018 - December, 2018
 Skills: HTML5, JavaScript, CSS, FOCAL

  • JavaScript version of the 1969 text-based Lunar Game which was implemented by Jim Storer using the FOCAL Programming Language.
Research : Apollo Guidance Computer (Architecture and Software)

 Role : Individual Researcher
 Duration: September, 2018 - October, 2018
 Class: CS 164 - Introduction to Computer Science
 Faculty: Dr. Brian Stuart

  • Explained the AGC architecure and software and compared it to the efficiency of modern computers.
View Submitted Paper
MediFreeze: Portable Medicine Storage Device

 Role : Founder and Team Leader
 Duration: June, 2017 - August, 2017
 Event: Innovative Product and Marketing Competition
 Awards: Most Innovative Product Scientific Product, Second Overall Position

  • Assembled and led a team of six people and designed a travel-friendly medical device for storage and instant cooling of temperature-specific medical products based on the principle of Peltier Effect
  • Launched and marketed the final product at a base price of 5.50 USD
View Project
Text-Based Railway Management System

 Role : Developer
 Duration: January, 2015 - February, 2015

  • Developed a text-based simulator of the local railway management system using object-oriented Java programming
  • Implemented features like ticket-booking, inquiry, cancellation, station maintainence, job vacancy, shop availability
  • Collaborated with two other developers and completed the project using Waterfall software development methods
View GitHub Repository




Leadership

  Drexel Algorithms and Data Structure

Position: Vice President

  • Prepare students for rigorous technical interviews through regular training, simulations, and coding competitions on core data-structures concepts.
  • Set-up a recruiting pipeline through the rapport of our executive board members with Big-N company recruiters in the United States by referring the students who seem prepared for the tough technical interviews.

April 2019 - Present

  Math and Computer Science Society

Position: Vice President

  • Organized an Open-Source Software, Cigna Health Care Tech Talk, Introduction to Comp Sci course review individually and in collaboration with other organizations.
  • Update the organization website as per the needs and manage the event forms, facilities, and forms.

September 2018 - June 2019

  Drexel Indian Undergrad Student Asso.

Position: Executive Officer

  • Meet and Contact managers for food, facilities, and inviting the artists.
  • Marketing using the posters, fliers, social media accounts, and organization website.
  • Raise funds and seek events and facilities approval from the Student Center
  • Manage the facilities and decorate the venue for the event day.

October 2018 - June 2019

  TGES TED-Ed Club

Position: Speaker

    Considering my eco-friendly ventures like introducing the Green Revolution program in my hometown followed by the Climate Counsellor internship experience with International Centre for Culture and Education (ICCE), I was invited to be a speaker at a TED-Ed conference organized in my city.

  • Conference Theme: United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
  • Invited to talk about the Sustainable Development Goal No. 13, i.e. Climate Action.
View Talk

December 2017





Certifications/Online Courses

Name Organization Place Date
HonorSociety Membership Certification HonorSociety.org Washington DC, USA November 25, 2019
BC 101 - Blockchains and Cryptography International Blockchain Olympiad Hong Kong October 30, 2019
Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning Summer School Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati, India July 2019
Google Developers Machine Learning Bootcamp Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, India July 2019
Machine Learning Stanford University Coursera Online June-July 2019
Introductory Python Course Sequence (I - IV) Microsoft Corporation edx Online September 2018
High School Leadership Training Camp M.R. Pai Foundation Mumbai, India April 2017
Stanford Pre-Collegiate Summer Institutes (Knot Theory) Stanford University California, United States June-July 2016




Major Courses

Year:    Sophomore (Second)
Major GPA:    3.93
Overall GPA:    3.93
TERM - FALL 2018
Name University Credits Professor Details
Calculus I, II, III (MATH121,MATH122, MATH123) CollegeBoard AP Credits 12 NA Catalog
Honors - Intro to Computer Science (CS 164) Drexel University 3 Dr. Brian Stuart CS 164
Computing & Informatics Design I (CI 101) Drexel University 2 Dr. Tammy Pirmann CI 101
Linear Algebra (MATH 201) Drexel University 4 Dr. Dennis G. Yang MATH 201
Introduction to Honors Program (HNRS 200) Drexel University 1 Julia Wisniewski HNRS 200


TERM - WINTER 2019
Name University Credits Professor Details
Computer Programming I (CS 171) Drexel University 3 Dr. Mark Boady CS 171
Computer Programming II (CS 172) ** Drexel University 3 NA (Credits By Exam) CS 172
Computing & Informatics Design II (CI 102) Drexel University 2 Dr. Erjia Yan CI 102
Multivariate Calculus (MATH 200) Drexel University 4 Dr. Ronald Perline Catalog


TERM - SPRING 2019
Name University Credits Professor Details
Advanced Programming Techniques (CS 265) Drexel University 3 Dr. Kurt Schmidt CS 265
Mathematical Foundations of Computer Science (CS 270) Drexel University 3 Dr. Bruce Char CS 270
Computing & Informatics Design III (CI 103) Drexel University 2 Dr. Erjia Yan CI 103


TERM - FALL 2019
Name University Credits Professor Details
Independent Research (CS T280) Hong Kong University of Sci & Tech. (COMP 4937B) 4 Dr. Pan Hui Above Sections
Systems Architecture (CS 281) Hong Kong University of Sci & Tech. (COMP 2611) 4 Dr. Cindy Li COMP 2611
Discrete Math (MATH 221) Hong Kong University of Sci & Tech. (COMP 2711) 3 Dr. Dimitris Papadopoulos COMP 2711
Probability & Statistics I (MATH 311) Hong Kong University of Sci & Tech. (MATH 2421) 4 Dr. Xia Dong MATH 2421


TERM - WINTER 2020
Name University Credits Professor Details
Data Structures (CS 260) Drexel University 3 Galen Long CS 260
Systems Programming (CS 283) Drexel University 3 Dr. Constantine Katsinis CS 283
Web & Mobile App Development (CS 375) Drexel University 3 Dr. Matthew Burlick CS 375


TERM - SPRING 2020 (COOP TERM)
Name University Credits Professor Details
Computer Networks & Security (CS 475) Drexel University 3 Dr. Brian Stuart CS 475


TERM - SUMMER 2020 (COOP TERM)
Name University Credits Professor Details
Operating Systems (CS 370) Drexel University 3 Dr. Brian Stuart CS 370


**Credits By Exam  - If a student is already familiar with the course content, he/she can choose to only take the final exam for the class and get grade & credits for it (based on the score).





Recommendations

  Dr. William Mongan, Ph.D.

Position: Former Associate Dept. Head
Dept: College of Computing & Informatics
Organization: Drexel University
Location: Philadelphia, PA United States
Date: July 23, 2019
Ocassion: Club Leader, Google DSC @ Drexel
Status: Received

View

  Dr. Dimitris Chatzopoulos, Ph.D.

Position: Research Assistant Professor
Dept: Computer Science & Engineering
Organization: Hong Kong University of Sci & Tech
Location: Kowloon, Hong Kong
Date: NA
Ocassion: Machine Learning Researcher @ SymLab, HKUST
Status: Pending

View


  Dr. Pan Hui, Ph.D.

Position: Professor
Dept: Computer Science & Engineering
Organization: Hong Kong Uni of Sci & Tech; Uni of Helsinki
Location: Kowloon, Hong Kong
Date: NA
Ocassion: Machine Learning Researcher @ SymLab, HKUST
Status: Pending

View

  Jay Pavagadhi, MS

Position: Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
Dept: NA
Organization: Olak,Inc.
Location: Santa Clara, CA United States
Date: June 24, 2020
Ocassion: Machine Learning Researcher @ Olak,Inc.
Status: Received

View


**I am still waiting on a few recommendations. It will be updated as they arrive.





Travel


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