I am a final-year Ph.D. student in the ECE department at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. I am fortunate to be advised by Prof. Subhonmesh Bose. Prior to this, I received M.Eng. from UIUC and B.S. from Zhejiang University in 2019.

My CV can be found here (April 2024) CV.

Research

Autonomous systems are just around the corner. Different from “automated” agents that operate in a fixed world, “autonomous” ones should be able to conceptualize, reason, and act in changing environments without human intervention. How can autonomous agents understand the environment landscape? How to learn a representation of the environment such that knowledge can be transferred to related environments, and extrapolated to unknown environments? How could we control the complexity of such a representation? The goal of my research is to answer these questions.

• Nonparametric Compressed Learning of Dynamical Systems:

• B. Hou, A.Reddy Ramapuram Matavalam, S.Bose, U.Vaidya, “Propagating Uncertainty Through System Dynamics in Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Space “, Physica D: Nonlinear Phenomena. Special issue: Topics at the Interface of Machine Learning and Dynamical Systems, 2024. download

  Also presented as a poster paper at the American Control Conference (ACC) 2023.

• B. Hou, S. Sanjari, N. Dahlin, S. Bose, U. Vaidya, “Sparse Learning of Dynamical Systems in Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Space: An Operator-Theoretic Approach”, in Proceedings of the Fortieth International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML), 2023. download

• B. Hou, S. Sanjari, N. Dahlin, S. Bose, “Compressed Decentralized Learning of Conditional Mean Embedding Operators in Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Space”, in Proceedings of the 37th Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Conference on Artificial Intelligence, 2023. download

• B. Hou, S. Bose and U. Vaidya, “Sparse Learning of Kernel Transfer Operators”, in Proceedings of the Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems, and Computers, 2021. download

• (Preprint) A.Reddy Ramapuram Matavalam, B. Hou, H.Choi, S.Bose, U.Vaidya, “Data-Driven Transient Stability Analysis Using the Koopman Operator”, under revision at the International Journal of Electrical Power and Energy Systems, 2024. download

• (Preprint) B. Hou, S. Sanjari, A. Koppel, S. Bose, “Compressed Online Learning of Conditional Distribution with Kernels”. download

• Preparing Electrified Transportation:

  Electrification can help to reduce the carbon footprint of aviation. The transition away from the jet fuel-powered airplane towards battery-powered electrified aircraft will impose extra charging requirements on airports. In order to handle the impending electrification of commercial aviation, I study the interdependency of transportation (airlines) and the energy infrastructure at airports.

  • B. Hou, S. Bose, L. Marla and K. Haran, “Impact of Aviation Electrification on Airports: Flight Scheduling and Charging”, IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 2023. download

  • B. Hou, S. Bose, and K. Haran, “Powering Electric Aircraft at O’Hare Airport: A Case Study”, presented at the IEEE Power and Energy Society General Meeting, 2020. download

Awards

• Rising Stars in EECS, 2023
• M.A.Pai Scholarship, 2023
• Mavis Future Faculty Fellows (MF3), 2023-2024
• AAAI Student Scholarship, 2023
• The second-place winner in the United States Association for Energy Economics (USAEE) Case Competition, 2019.
• UCLA Cross-disciplinary Scholars in Science and Technology (CSST) Scholarship, 2017

Invited Presentations

• (Upcoming) September 2024, Sandia National Laboratories, Sandia Machine Learning and Deep Learning (MLDL) Workshop.
• July 2024, Fields Institute, the 4th Symposium on Machine Learning and Dynamical Systems.
• May 2024, Alan Turing Institute, Machine Learning and Dynamical Systems Seminar.
• April 2024, Northwestern, the 10th Midwest Workshop on Control and Game Theory.
• April 2024, UIUC, group meeting of Prof. R.Srikant and Prof. Carolyn Beck.
• March 2024, MIT, group meeting of Prof. Navid Azizan.
• Febburary 2024, Georgia Tech, Algorithms and Randomness Center (ARC) colloquium.
• November 2023, Georgia Tech, EECS Rising Stars Workshop.
• November 2023, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Grad Seminar in Special Topics.

Teaching

Fall 2021, Teaching Assistant, ECE 365 Data Science and Engineering, UIUC.

Fun

Outside of mathematics and engineering, I pursue my passion for dancing. I performed contemporary ballet and dance of the Han-Tang dynasties (a subcategory of Classical Chinese Dance) with Champaign Park District and Zhejiang Wenqin Art Troupe.