About Me

I am a Ph.D. student at the University of Florida, supervised by Prof. Sanjay Ranka and Prof. Anand Rangarajan, and I will graduate in Fall 2025. I earned my bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Sun Yat-Sen University under the supervision of Prof. Dong Zhang in 2018 and 2020, respectively. My research focuses on applying deep learning to solve practical problems, with expertise spanning vision-language model, generative AI, data compression, smart transportation, AI for science (e.g., climate modeling, turbulence), and human-computer interaction.

Currently, I am working on vision-language model for vision navigation and foundational diffusion models for data reduction and spatiotemporal data generation. I also have experience with unsupervised learning, point cloud data processing, and gesture, gaze, and pose estimation, as well as designing and building large-scale datasets.

I am actively seeking summer and fall internships in 2025, with the goal of securing a return offer to begin full-time work at the end of 2025.

Research Interests:

• Generative AI
• Multimodal Language Model (MLLM)
• Data Reduction
• Smart Transportation
• Human-Computer Interaction

🔥 News

• 2025.4:   Our paper “Bridging Generation and Compression: Latent Diffusion for Efficient Spatiotemporal Data Reconstruction” has been submitted in Supercomputing Conference (SC).
• 2025.2:  🎉🎉 Our paper “Foundation Model for Lossy Compression of Spatiotemporal Scientific Data” has been accepted in Pacific-Asia Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (PAKDD).
• 2025.2:  🎉🎉 Our paper “Machine Learning Techniques for Data Reduction of Climate Applications” has been accepted in Pacific-Asia Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (PAKDD).
• 2024.12:  ⭐⭐ Xiao Li presented the work “Attention Based Machine Learning Methods for Data Reduction with Guaranteed Error Bounds” at IEEE BigData 2024 in Washington DC, USA.
• 2024.10:  🎉🎉 Our paper “Attention Based Machine Learning Methods for Data Reduction with Guaranteed Error Bounds” has been accepted in IEEE BigData 2024.
• 2024.06:  ⭐⭐ Xiao Li presented the work “A Data-driven Approach for Probabilistic Traffic Prediction and Simulation at Signalized Intersections” at 2024 IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV) in Jeju, Korea.
• 2024.04:  🎉🎉 Our paper “An Efficient Semi-Automated Scheme for Infrastructure LiDAR Annotation” has been accepted” has been accepted in IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems.
• 2024.03:  🥇🥇 Congratulations to Xiao Li on being selected as the Gartner Group Graduate Fellowship recipient at UFL!
• 2024.03:  ⭐⭐ Xiao Li presented the work “Hybrid Approaches for Data Reduction of Spatiotemporal Scientific Applications” at the DCC Conference in Snowbird, Utah.
• 2024.01:  🎉🎉 Our work “Hybrid Approaches for Data Reduction of Spatiotemporal Scientific Applications” has been accepted in Data Compression Conference.
• 2023.07:  🎉🎉 Our paper “A Spatiotemporal Correspondence Approach to Unsupervised LiDAR Segmentation with Traffic Applications” has been accepted in IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference.
• 2023.05:  🎉🎉 Our work “Computer-aided autism spectrum disorder diagnosis with behavior signal processing” has been accepted in IEEE Transactions on Affective Computing.
• 2023.03:  🎉🎉 Our paper “An Efficient Semi-Automated Scheme for LiDAR Annotation and A Benchmark Infrastructure Dataset” has been accepted in ICLR ML4IoT.
• 2022.11:  🎉🎉 Our paper “Accurate Head Pose Estimation Using Image Rectification and A Lightweight Convolutional Neural Network” has been accepted in IEEE Transactions on Multimedia.
• 2021.09:  🎉🎉 Our paper “Concurrent Two-factor Identify Verification Using Facial Identify and Facial Actions” has been accepted in Electronic Imaging.

📖 Educations

University of Florida

- Ph.D. Student in Computer Science

- Advisor: Prof. Ranka Sanjay, Co-advised by Prof. Anand Rangarajan

- 2021.08 - Present

Sun Yat-sen University

- M.S. in Electronics and Communication, Outstanding Graduate

- Prof. Dong Zhang

- 2018.08 - 2020.08

Sun Yat-sen University

- B.S. in Communication Engineering

- 2014.08 - 2018.08

📝 Publications

Foundation Models for Error-Bounded Lossy Data Compression

Smart Transportation and Point Cloud Processing

Advanced Human Pose and Identity Recognition Techniques

📝 Projects

Real-Time 3D Hand Pose Estimation with Deep Heatmap-Based Network

Hand-Computer Intection, Deep Learning, Hand Keypoints Estimation, Mesh Deformation.

Xiao Li, Hui Hu

Project Page

3D Face Modeling and Head Pose Tracking with Comsumer RGB-D Cameras

Point Cloud, 3D Geometry, Face Modeling, Head Pose Estimation

Xiao Li, Dong Zhang

Project Page

Accurate Head Pose Estimation Using Image Rectification and Lightweight Convolutional Neural Network

Head Pose Estimation, Image Rectification, Lightweighted Convolutional Neural Networks

Xiao Li, Dong Zhang

Project Page

Appearance-Based Gaze Estimation from Full Face Image

Gaze Estimation, Attention Analysis, Gaze-Computer Interaction

Xiao Li, Dong Zhang

Project Page

🎖 Honors and Awards

• 2024.05 Gartner Group Graduate Fellowship
• 2020.06 Outstanding Graduate
• 2019.09 First Class Scholarship
• 2018.09 Second Class Scholarship
• 2016.09 MCM/ICM Contest Meritorious Winner

👨‍💻 Professional Services

Paper Reviewer:

• IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems (TNNLS) (2024)
• Machine vision and applications (2023)

💻 Professional Experience and Internships

• 2020.12 - 2021.08: CVTE (Research Assistant)
  • Worked on hand-computer interaction for XR headset.

• 2020.08 - 2020.12: Duke Kunshan University, China

• 2019.08 - 2019.12: Duke Kunshan University, China

📚 Teaching Experience

• CAP6610 Spring 2024 - Machine Learning
• COT5615 Fall 2023 - Math for Intelligent Systems
• COP3530 Fall 2021 - Data Structure and Algorithms