Li Zhu, Ph.D.

Curriculum Vitae

Li Zhu, Ph.D.

Google Scholar: Citations: 510 | h-index: 12 | i10-index: 15

Employment

2019 – Present

Staff Research Engineer II

Samsung Research America, Mountain View, CA

Lead AI-driven innovation at the intersection of wearable sensing and real-world health monitoring, delivering solutions from prototyping to clinical validation.

  • Cuffless Blood Pressure Monitoring: Led ML-based BP estimation using ear-worn PPG and inertial sensors
  • Contactless Vital Sign Monitoring: Developed AI models to estimate heart rate, respiration, and SpO2 from facial video
  • AFib Burden Estimation: Led smartwatch-based AFib monitoring; published cover-featured study in IEEE JBHI (2023)
  • Advanced Bio-sensing: Spearheaded transcranial vagus nerve stimulation in earbud form factor
2018 – 2019

Data Scientist

AlayaTec, Inc., Palo Alto, CA

Developed predictive ML models from functional brain imaging (scalp/ear EEG) for analyzing complex neuro/behavioral data.

2016

Research Intern

Siemens Healthineers, Princeton, NJ

IARPA Knowledge Representation in Neural Systems – Contributed to analytic frameworks using MEG for neural decoding.

2013 – 2018

Research & Teaching Assistant

Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ

Integrated Systems and NeuroImaging Laboratory – Ph.D. research on computational methods for predicting behavior from neuroimaging data.

2008 – 2013

R&D Manager of Electrical Engineering

Grandbeing Technology Co. Ltd., Shenzhen, China

Led system-level hardware design and R&D for professional-grade digital audio/video distribution systems. Supervised 20+ member multidisciplinary team.

2004 – 2008

Electrical Engineer

Skyworth Research Institute, Shenzhen, China

High Definition Display Research Group – Led full hardware development for CRT and LCD TVs.

Education

October 2018

Ph.D., Electrical and Computer Engineering

Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Dissertation: Computational Methods for Predicting Behavior from Neuroimaging Data
Advisor: Professor Laleh Najafizadeh

Certificate

Certificate in Project Management

Stanford University
June 2008

M.S., Electronics and Communication Engineering

Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China
June 2004

B.S., Information Engineering

Wuhan University of Technology, China

Honors & Awards

  • SRA President’s Award – Samsung Research America (2020, 2025)
  • A1 Patent Inventor Award – Samsung Research America (2023, 2024)
  • ECE Graduate Program Academic Achievement Award – Rutgers University (2020)
  • Best Student Paper Award (Runner Up) – IEEE ISCAS 2014, among 600+ accepted papers
  • Young Researcher Award – Skyworth Research Institute, top 10 among 300+ graduates (2005)
  • First Prize Scholarship – Wuhan University of Technology, top 1% among 10,000+ students (2003-2004)

Skills

Python MATLAB Machine Learning Deep Learning Signal Processing TensorFlow PyTorch PPG/ECG Analysis Computer Vision Wearable Sensors Clinical Validation fNIRS EEG