Hi, I'm John Zhang.

A
Self-motivated Machine Learning Researcher and Software Engineer ready to solve interesting and challenging problems.

About

I am an Engineering Science Student at the University of Toronto. I am passionate about problem-solving and software development. I'm self-motivated, a fast learner, and very gritty. I have worked on many software projects in Python, C, C++, and Javascript during my bachelor's. I have 24 months of professional work experience throughout my internships and co-op term, where I worked on C++, C# backends writing performant and Object Oriented code and applying Machine learning to business needs. I want to develop applications on the cutting edge that solve real-world problems.

  • Languages: Python, C, C++, C#, JavaScript, SQL, Bash, Tcl, Verilog, MATLAB
  • Libraries: NumPy, Pandas
  • Technologies:Flask, Node.js, Vue.js, React, Transformers, PyTorch, JAX, TensorFlow, HTML, CSS
  • Tools: Git, Perforce, Azure ML, Linux, Docker, Jira

Interested in opportunities to work in Software Engineering leveraging my skills in Machine Learning.

Experience

Software/Machine Learning Engineer
  • Led R&D into a novel GenAI feature that improves hardware design flows by leveraging LLM design generation.
  • Built a data processing and augmentation pipeline to create a hardware system dataset with millions of tokens.
  • Outperformed SOTA prompt-engineered foundation models by 300% on test set by leveraging performance efficient fine tuning (QLoRA) and RAG to fine-tune an open source LLM with Transformers library on Azure ML Studio.
  • Designed a custom language for LLM outputs, increasing total inference speed by 100% from baseline.
  • Developed and integrated C++ and Tcl code to support the migration to a modern database for Quartus tools, using Object Oriented Programming patterns for improved maintainability.
  • Architected a testing framework for a user-facing debug tool and used it to validate the tool’s reliability on thousands of inputs from customer designs.
  • Continuously resolved customer requests and bugs by implementing software features and fixes, including creating a Quartus Python module for merging customer debug files.
  • Designed a custom language for LLM outputs, increasing total inference speed by 100% from baseline.
  • Tools: C++, Python, Transformers, AzureML, Bash, Tcl
May 2023 - Aug 2024 | San Jose, California
Undergraduate Machine Learning Researcher
  • Developed a pipeline to process 40,000 datapoints with xtb, Open Babel, and PyTorch, building a molecule dataset. dispenser robots; improved an optimization algorithm that reduced the cycle-time of the automation process by 25%.
  • Trained and tuned graph convolutional neural networks to predict molecule solubility with Pytorch Geometric while experimenting with various architectures and physical chemistry features
  • Demonstrated that a electronic surface mesh approach is valid on solubility task, beating some architectures such as XGBoost and GC by 10% in RMSE loss on ESOL solubility task
  • Tools: Python, PyTorch, Bash, Pyvista, Openbabel, xtb
Sep 2021 - Apr 2023 | Toronto, Canada
Software Engineering Intern
  • Developed a program in C++ that fixes mesh holes by transforming meshes into voxel grids with OpenVDB.
  • Improved triangle element feature query speed in C# by more than 10x by redesigning algorithms to leverage Bounding Volume Hierarchies.
  • Collaborated on and presented a cross-platform model viewer in Typescript using Vue.js and Electron.Bounding Volume Hierarchies.
  • Developed an augmented reality interactive 3D geotechnical model viewer app using Unreal Engine 4 and deployed it on the Microsoft HoloLens.
  • Tools:C++, C#, Javascript/Typescript, Vue.js, Node.js
July 2018 - Nov 2018 | Ahmedabad, India

Projects

Skills

Languages and Databases

Python
C++
C
Javascript
C#
Bash

Libraries

Pytorch
Transformers
NumPy
Pandas
JAX

Frameworks

React
Flask
Vue.js
Node.js

Technologies

Git
Perforce
Linux
Docker
Azure ML

Education

University of Toronto

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Degree: Bacher of Applied Science in Engineering Science - Machine Intelligence

    Relevant Courseworks:

    • Bayesian Statistics
    • Probability
    • Multivariable Calculus
    • Linear Algebra
    • Differential Equations
    • Advanced Algorithms
    • Deep Learning
    • Classical Artificial Intelligence
    • Operating Systems

  • Software Engineering
  • Parallel Programming
  • Operating Systems
  • Decision Support Systems

Places Traveled

Contact

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