Stay updated with the latest news, events, and achievements from our research group.
Pengkun, Ava, Joonsun, Zijie, Tiantian presented their research at the 2025 International Conference on Computing in Civil Engineering (I3CE). Their work spans topics such as drone-assisted inspection, vehicle inspection training, personalized learning in modular construction, human-AI collaboration, and reducing production waste.
May 15, 2025
We celebrated the achievements of our graduating members: Kahyun completed her postdoctoral research, Pengkun earned his Ph.D., and Zijie and Tiantian graduated with their M.S. degrees. Congratulations to all!
May 3, 2025
Seongeun was awarded the Chishiki AI in Civil Engineering Fellowship, hosted by UT Austin and supported by NSF and CII. Her project explores how AI can help capture and transfer tacit knowledge from experienced workers, especially in remote infrastructure operations. Using computer vision and multimodal sensor data, she aims to support trustworthy training and decision-making through virtual AI avatars.
April 14, 2025
Miaosi Dong, Joonsun Hwang and Dr. Pingbo Tang participated in the 2025 Manufacturing PA Innovation Program Expo, hosted by Harrisburg University of Science & Technology. The event, supported by the Pennsylvania Department of Community & Economic Development, brought together faculty, students, and industry partners to showcase emerging technologies in Pennsylvania manufacturing. HMHI Lab presented ongoing research on integrating AI and human intelligence to enhance workforce development and process optimization in HVAC manufacturing systems.
April 4, 2025
Ava presented her research on improving vehicle inspections to former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg during his recent visit to Pittsburgh. Her project combines human expertise and advanced technologies to ultimately make our roads safer.
Feb, 2025
Miaosi has been awarded the prestigious Liang Ji-Dan Graduate Fellowship in recognition of her outstanding academic achievements and research contributions. Her current research focuses on enhancing worker guidance in customized HVAC component manufacturing by integrating human expertise and machine intelligence. Through explainable AI and human-knowledge-guided Bayesian optimization, she aims to reduce setup waste and improve collaboration in complex production systems.
Feb, 2025
Jinfeng was selected as a 2024 CBI Fellow by the Carnegie Bosch Institute. His fellowship research focuses on developing AI systems that adapt to rapidly changing urban environments, with a specific focus on subway flood resilience. The fellowship is co-hosted by Professors Pingbo Tang and Cleotilde Gonzalez at Carnegie Mellon University.
Nov 22, 2024
Prof. Pingbo Tang, Prof. Beibei Li (Heinz College), Ruoxin Xiong, Yael Netser, and Joonsun Hwang organized a workshop titled "Empowering Civil Engineering with Generative AI: Opportunities, Risks, and Future Directions" at the ASCE i3CE 2024 Conference. The session addressed GAI’s impact on AEC workflows, ethical concerns, and future directions through talks and breakout discussions.
Jul 28, 2024
Pengkun Liu was highlighted by NSF’s ACCESS program for creating a virtual water treatment plant using PSC’s Bridges‑2 supercomputer. His simulation enables risk‑free testing of scenarios—from emergencies to equipment upgrades—preserving senior engineers’ expertise and speeding up trainee education. “We rely on powerful GPUs for both VR rendering and AI model training,” Liu notes. This work advances digital‑twin and AI methods for sustainable water infrastructure management.
April 9, 2024
Pengkun Liu leveraged PSC’s Bridges‑2 GPUs to build a virtual water‑treatment plant that learns from veteran engineers’ responses to simulated breakdowns. His AI achieved a 0.712 recall in fault identification (versus 0.851 for experts), and together human‑AI recall rose to 0.885. Next, Liu plans to use this VR environment to train new engineers, creating a scalable human‑AI co‑learning system for sustainable water infrastructure.
Feb 28, 2024