ABOUT ME

Hey, I am Ke Zhao (often go by Coco), and I am a senior at the University of Pennsylvania double majoring Cognitive Science and Computer Science. I grew up in Wenzhou, a port city in the East coast China, and moved to Philadelphia when I was 16. In my spare time, I love travelling, solving Rubick's cube, doing Sudukos and playing the piano.

At Penn, I do research for Dr. Rao in studying how people make decisions and work as a research assistant for Dr. Sheline in the CNDS for a real-time neurofeedback project.

EDUCATION

  • University of Pennsylvania - College of Arts and Sciences

    Candidate for B.A May 2022
    Cognitive Science
    Computer Science

  • Relevent Courses

    CIS521: Artificial Intelligence
    CIS419: Applied Machine Learning
    CIS545: Big Data Analytics
    CIS550: Database and Information Systems
    CIS350: Software Design/Engineering
    CIS320: Introduction to Algorithms
    CIS121: Data Structures and Algorithms
    CIS195: Android App Development
    PSYC273: NeuroEconomics
    OIDD290: Decision Processes
    PSYC111: Perception
    BIBB109: Intro to Brain and Behavior

RESEARCH

How people make risky decisions? How people behave differently after sleep loss? How to treate people with mental illness with advanced technology ? How to use machine learning and brain imaging technology to better study human minds? I hope to answer these quesitons one day.

I have been worked in brain imaging research lab since 2016. Currently, I am conducting independent research projects with Dr. Hengyi Rao in Center for Functional Neuroimaging at UPenn on topics related to individual risky decision making. I am also conducting a real time fMRI feedback project under guidance of Dr. Sheline in the CNDS at Penn Medicine and Dr. Norman in Computational Memory Lab at Princeton.

Below are some projects that I am currently working on or did in the past

On-going Projects

  • Real time fMRI Project

    Investigate the effect of real time fMRI feedback in reducing depression and the relationship among symptoms, brain measures and actigraphy in defining biotypes across depressed and anxious individuals.
    fMRI
    Machine learning
    web cloud

  • CogBrain Web Platform Project

    With the widespread of COVID-19, lots of research groups are unable to conduct in-person experiment. This website was developed to be a reliable, accessible, flexible, and secure online tool for researchers to easily collect behavioral data. Go to the website.
    behavoral tasks
    web development

Past Projects

  • Age and Gender Effects on Risk-taking Behavior

    This study investigates the effects of age and gender on risky decision-making across the life span by using cognitive behavioral task and cognitive modeling on a large dataset.
    behavoral task
    web development
    cognitive modeling

  • Decision-making and Sensation Seeking

    This study uses ERP with the balloon analogue risk task to investigate how individual differences in sensation seeking modulate brian responses to risk-taking with different potential reward/loss magnitude.
    EEG
    behavoral Task

  • Sleep Habits and Emotional Experiences Project (SHEEP)

    This project examines the interplay between reward processing, actigraph-assessed sleep parameters, and well-being in college students.

    sleep
    daily checking

  • Altered Spontaneous Brain Activity in OCD

    This study used fMRI to examine whether Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) patients will exhibit altered spontaneous brain activity as compared to healthy controls.
    fMRI
    OCPD

  • Perfusion imaging of fatigue and time-on-task effects from sustained mental workload in patients with Parkinson’s disease

    In this study, we combined Arterial spin labeled(ASL) perfusion functional MRI with a sustained mental workload paradigm to examine the neural correlates of fatique and time-on-task effects in PD.
    fMRI
    ASL
    Parkinson's disease

  • Test-retest reliability of CBF for accessing brain function at rest and during a vigilance task

    This study investigated the comparative reliability of Arterial spin labeled(ASL) measures by doing scanning in a strictly controlled in-laboratory while at rest and during performing a simple and reliable psychomotor vigilance test.
    fMRI
    ASL

Software Development

Below are a list of projects I did in the past few years.
Some projects below are the coding part of the above research projects.

CogBrain

  • A web platform that tests individual's cognitive ability via a series of cognitive tasks. Researcheres could use it to make custom online studies and collect data easily.
  • This website has attracted more than 3k players to play the tasks.
    • >Website link

    front-endAWSMySQL

    BrainIAK Project

    BrainIAK applies advanced machine learning methods and high-performance computing to analyzing neuroimaging data. It includes fMRI modules for FCMA, MVPA, and more.
    >Website link

    Pythonfront-end

    Stay Home and Eat Well

  • A web application allows users to search for recipes satisfying certain criteria corresponding to ingredients, nutritional value, preparation time, ratings and reviews, and other user inputted information.
    • >Github link

    REACT JSMySQLAWS



    ForeverBrain

  • A recruiting and job matching platform that help companies build the workforce in the future using brain science and audited AI technology.
  • The platform used a series of objective behavioral games that allow companies don't judge a job seeker by their resume alone.
    • frone-endmachine learningMySQL