Lab Director

Oliver (Ollie) Cossairt

I am an Assistant Professor in the EECS Department at Northwestern University. My research interests lie at the intersection of optics, computer vision, and computer graphics. Before  joining Northwestern, I spent one year (Oct. 2011 – Aug. 2012) as a Postdoctoral Researcher at Columbia University, under the supervision of Professor Prof. Shree Nayar. I earned my Ph.D. in Computer Science from Columbia University. In September 2011, I completed my dissertation on The Limits and Tradeoffs in Computational Imaging. From September 2006-2011, I was a doctoral candidate at Columbia University under the advisement Prof. Shree Nayar and Prof. Peter Belhumeur. I received an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship from 2008-2011. From 2003-2006, I worked as an Optical and Software Engineer, managing a NIST ATP research initiative to develop next generation 3D displays for a Actuality Systems. In 2003, I received an M.S. from the MIT Media Lab, where I worked with the Spatial Imaging Group and wrote my thesis on View-Sequential 3D Displays.

Personal Website: Visit Ollie’s Homepage


 

Graduate Students


Hamid Hasani                                                         

Hamid is a PhD candidate in Electrical Engineering Department, Signal & System track. He has a diverse educational background. Hamid received a master’s degree in Engineering & Applied Sciences from University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from K. N. Toosi University of Technology in Iran.
His research interests include optical metrology, imaging and display systems, computational imaging, and computer vision. He is currently working on hardware development of a data driven and wide-angle 3D holographic display prototype with high spatial bandwidth product, hardware development of a holographic printer prototype with high quality playback, and lightfield microscopy for high-speed imaging of neuronal activity. 
Hamid also worked as a research intern at Meta Reality Labs where he worked on the volume Bragg grating waveguides for applications in augmented & virtual realities head mounted displays.


Florian Schiffers

Florian graduated 2017 from FAU Erlangen in Germany where he received a M.Sc. in Physics and a M.Sc.Hons in Advanced Optical Technologies. He wrote his thesis on Computed Tomography in Talbot-Lau X-ray Phase-Contrast Imaging under the joint supervision of Prof. Gisela Anton, Dr-Ing Christian Riess and Prof. Andreas Maier.
Prior to this Florian was conducting research in the field of optical 3D sensing in the group of Prof. Gerd Häusler (2012-2015). Later, he worked at Siemens Healthineers on a pre-development project in robotics for image-guided surgery. After graduation he spent six months at the Peking University in China with the Department of Biomedical Engineering lead by Prof. Qiushi Ren working on machine learning applications in Ophthalmology.

At Northwestern Florian is working on algorithm development for inverse problems. He is especially interested on how to enhance conventional techniques, e.g. reconstruction based on physical models, by exploiting the power of data-driven machine learning.  His current projects include imaging through scattering media, extended depth-of-field imaging, tomographic problems with different modalities as well as topographic imaging.


Lionel Fiske

Lionel is a PhD candidate in the Department of Engineering Science and Applied Mathematics and is completing a joint PhD at the University of Amsterdam’s Academic Medical Center in the Department of Forensic Biophysics.  His research interests include diffuse optical imaging, optical coherence tomography, multi-modal imaging, and data fusion.  In collaboration with NU-ACCESS, Lionel is currently working to develop techniques to identify materials in paintings using non-destructive and optical techniques.

 


Jiazhang Wang

Jiazhang Wang is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Northwestern University. Before joining Northwestern, he earned his master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University and bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST). His research interests include computational photography, 3D optical metrology, and computer vision. He is currently working on developing a novel eye-tracking prototype using optical metrology.

 


Aniket Dashpute

Aniket is a Ph.D. student in the Electrical Engineering Department. His current research includes using Event Cameras for 3D shape measurement and applying Computational Imaging techniques to Thermal Imaging & Rendering. He is also interested in Neural Rendering and its applications to computational photography.

Aniket completed his undergrad in EE at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT D), India in 2018 where he was advised by Prof. Kedar Khare. He then worked at Samsung Research Institute Bangalore, India till 2020 in the Computer Graphics team responsible for rendering and visualizing medical ultrasound data. He is a member of the CPL lab led by Prof. Oliver Cossairt and Prof. Katsaggelos, and 3DIM lab led by Prof. Florian Willomitzer.


Manuel Ballester

Manuel Ballester is a doctoral candidate at Northwestern University. His research applies novel optimization techniques, advanced computational methods, and machine learning approaches to optics and imaging problems. He is interested in the material characterization of semiconductors (such as CZT and Silicon) to improve sensor performance. He also works on 3D object reconstruction and improving dynamic holographic displays.

Manuel completed his BSc in Mathematics in 2018 at the University of Cadiz. He received an MSc in Optical Physics in 2021 at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. He is a member of the IVPL lab led by Prof. Katsaggelos, the 3DIM lab led by Prof. Willomitzer, and the CPL lab led by Prof. Cossairt.


Jipeng Sun

Jipeng Sun is a Ph.D. student in the CS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He is interested in building machines that enhance the human visual system and empowering machine intelligence with biological-inspired neural networks. His research interests include light-field microscopy, computer-generated holography display, and AR system. Jipeng is currently working on imaging live zebrafish brain neuron firing patterns using programmable 3D light-field microscopy. He received his Master degree in Computer Science from Northwestern University, US, and Bachelor degree with honor in Software Engineering from Shandong University, China. Before coming to Northwestern, Jipeng worked full-time in the Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CASIA) on brain-inspired robotics bodily-self model project during 2019-2021.

Personal Website: Visit Jipeng’s Homepage

Projects: Computational Framework for Light Field Microscopy Simulation and Optimization 



Previous Lab Members

Yudong Yao

Yudong Yao is currently a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Northwestern University. She received the B.S. degree from Shandong University, Shandong, China, in 2012, and the Ph.D. degree in optical engineering from Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in 2017.  Her current research interests include ptychography, coherent diffraction imaging method, X-ray imaging, and three-dimensional imaging.


image10Nathan Matsuda

Nathan is a Ph.D. student in the EECS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He completed his undergrad at Northwestern University, after which he worked for several years in the special-effects industry. Nathan studies novel methods for 3D imaging in challenging environments. His current research topics include high-speed laser scanning, snapshot 3D microscopy, and photometric stereo methods for cultural heritage applications. Nathan is also an Emmy-nominated visual effects artist with credits including ABC’s Once Upon a Time and Pixar’s W.A.L.L.-E.

Projects: Investigating an Ancient Mummy with Augmented Reality Focal Surface Displays Compressive Reconstruction For 3D Incoherent Holographic Microscopy A Streamlined Photometric Stereo Framework for Cultural Heritage Toward Long Distance, Sub-diffraction Imaging Using Coherent Camera Arrays

Personal Website: Visit Nathan’s Homepage


Sudarshan Nagesh

Sudarshan Nagesh is currently a Research Specialist at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Northwestern University. He received the B.Tech. degree from National Institute of Technology Karnataka (NITK), Surathkal, India, in 2012, and the M.Sc. (Engineering) degree in signal processing from Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, India in 2015. He received the MS degree in computational imaging from the Rice University, Houston, USA in 2017. His research interests include computational imaging, ptychography, phase-retrieval, and finite-rate-of innovation signal sampling.

 


Marina Alterman

Marina Alterman was a postdoctoral researcher in the Comp. Photo. Lab at Northwestern University. Marina earned her PhD in Electrical Engineering from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, advised by Prof. Yoav Schechner and Prof. Joseph Shamir. Her research dealt with vision through random refractive media, such as wavy water and turbulent air. She received her MSc degree in Electrical Engineering from the Technion, advised by Prof. Yoav Schechner on the subject of multiplexed fluorescence unmixing. Marina’s BSc degree is in Electrical and Bio-medical Engineering, also from the Technion.

 


image08Xiang Huang

Xiang Huang was a postdoctoral researcher in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University from 2013 through 2016. Xiang Huang earned his PhD in Computer Science at Northwestern University, advised by Professor Jack Tumblin. He received his master’s degree in Electrical Engineeringunder Professor Xiaolin Wu at McMaster University, Canada, in 2006, and his bachelor’s degree in Electronics & Informationl Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), China, in 2003, respectively. Xiang Huang is interested in solving challenging problems in Computational Photography, Image Processing, Machine Learning, Computer Graphics and Computer Vision.

Projects: Guided Event Filtering, CVPR 2020 Compressive Reconstruction For 3D Incoherent Holographic Microscopy A Streamlined Photometric Stereo Framework for Cultural Heritage Near Light Correction for Image Relighting and 3D Shape Recovery Gauguin: Surface Shape Studies of the Art of Paul Gauguin

Personal Website: Visit Xiang’s Homepage


 Leonidas Spinoulas

Leonidas Spinoulas was born in Korinthos, Greece, in 1986. He received his B.Sc. degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece in 2010. In September 2010 he joined Northwestern University under the supervision of Prof. Aggelos K. Katsaggelos and is currently co-advised by Prof. Cossairt. His primary research interests include Compressive Sensing, Sparse Representations, Signal and Image Restoration, Deblurring, Blind Deconvolution, Inverse Problems, Bayesian Methods and Computer Vision.

Projects: Compressive holographic video Compressive Reconstruction For 3D Incoherent Holographic Microscopy Ultra-Miniature Diffraction Gratings for Lensless Imaging High-Speed Compressive Video


photoRuibo Shang

Ruibo Shang was an intern in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University during the 2015-2016 academic year. His internship projects involve high dynamic range imaging with DMD system and 3D image refocusing & reconstruction.

 

 


Zhao Ming

Ming Zhao was a visiting scholar in the EECS of Northwestern University during 2017-2018. He is an associated professor in Dalian Maritime University of China. He received the B.S, M.S and Ph.D degree from Harbin Institute of Technology in 2005, 2007, and 2011, respectively. His current research interests include computational imaging/photography, super-resolution imaging, image processing and wavefront shaping, etc.

 


Jason Holloway

Jason Holloway is a Ph.D. candidate working under the guidance of Ashok Veeraraghavan in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department of Rice University. His research interests are in computational imaging & photography and computer vision. He earned his B.S. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering and Physics from Clarkson University in 2010 and his M.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Rice University in 2013. Jason is co-advised by Prof. Cossairt on his research on Macroscopic Fourier Ptychography.


image11Kuan He

Kuan He is a Ph.D. student in the EECS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He is interested in applying sparse modeling and compressed sensing techniques to Fourier Transform Holography and Coherent Diffraction Imaging, with applications to X-Ray imaging.

 

 


FengqiangFengqiang Li

Fengqiang Li is a Ph.D. student in the EECS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He is interested in image processing and various optical imaging techniques. He is currently working on Time-of-Flight imaging systems. Fengqiang received his Master degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Lehigh University, where he worked on optical coherence microscopy. Before that, Fengqiang got his Bachelor degree in Optoelectronic Information Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

Personal Website: Visit Fengqiang’s Homepage


Zihao (Winston) Wang

Zihao Wang is a Ph.D student in the EECS Department at Northwestern University. He received his B.S. degree in Optics from Zhejiang University with Honors from Chu Ko-Chen Honors College in China. His current research interest include computational imaging/photography, computer vision and color science (appearance).

Projects: Snapshot multifocal light field microscopy Guided Event Filtering, CVPR 2020 Event-driven Video Frame Synthesis Privacy-preserving Action Recognition using Coded Aperture Videos Dictionary-based phase retrieval for on-chip holographic video

Personal Website: Visit Winston’s Homepage


ChiaKai_YehChia-Kai (Kai) Yeh

Chia-Kai Yeh is a Ph.D student in the EECS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Electronics Engineering from Chang Gung University in Taiwan, after which he worked in the computational camera industry. His current research interest including Light Field and Reflectance Field acquisition, Appearance measurement and modeling.

Projects: Compressive time-of-flight imaging Shape-from-Shifting: Uncalibrated Photometric Stereo with a MobileDevice A Streamlined Photometric Stereo Framework for Cultural Heritage


Sushobhan Ghosh

Sushobhan Ghosh is a Ph.D. student in the EECS Department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He completed his undergrad at Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IIT Delhi), India in 2016. Sushobhan is interested in machine learning applications in computational photography and computer vision problems. His current research topics include deep learning based image enhancement in challenging environment, ptychography using automatic differentiation, deep learning based fourier ptychography and time of flight imaging.

Projects: ADP: Automatic Differentiation Ptychography PtychNet : CNN Based Fourier Ptychography


Fabian Wagner

Fabian is a visiting student from FAU Erlangen in Germany where currently pursuing his master. He wrote his Bachelor’s thesis on strong field triggered photo currents in Graphene at the chair of Laserphysics under the supervision of Prof. Peter Hommelhoff in 2017.  At the moment he is working on his Master’s thesis in the EECS Department at Northwestern University. His current research interests include topographical imaging and time of flight imaging. Prior to this Fabian was working at Advanced Breast-CT, a company developing a breast CT scanner for high resolution 3D imaging of the female breast.


Weixin Jiang

Weixin Jiang is a Ph.D. student in the EECS department working in the Computational Photography Lab at Northwestern University. He is interested in deep learning, image processing, various imaging techniques. He is currently working on Ptychography related projects. Before coming here, Weixin received his Master and Bachelor degree at Tsinghua University, China.

 

 



 

Affiliated Faculty

Florian Willomitzer

Florian graduated from the University of Erlangen‑Nuremberg, Germany, where he received his Ph.D. degree with honors (‘summa cum laude’) in 2017. At Erlangen, he worked in the group ‘Optical Sensing, Metrology and Inspection’ (OSMIN), led by Prof. Gerd Häusler. During his doctoral studies he investigated physical and information theoretical limits of optical 3D-sensing and implemented sensors that operate close to these limits. Concurrent to his activity at the Erlangen University, Florian was a freelancer in the research group’s spin-off company ‘3D‑Shape GmbH’ and he worked as a high school part-time teacher for physics.

At Northwestern University, Florian and his students develop novel methods to image hidden objects through scattering media or around corners. Moreover, his research is focused on high-resolution holographic displays, the implementation of high‑precision metrology methods in low-cost mobile handheld devices, and novel techniques to overcome traditional resolution limitations and dynamic range restrictions in 3D and 2D imaging.

Personal Website: Visit 3DIM Lab Homepage


Aggelos Katsaggelos

Aggelos Katsaggelos is Professor and AT&T Chair in the EECS Department at Northwestern University. He also runs the Image and Video Processing Laboratory (IVPL), whose objective is to generate cutting-edge research results in the fields of multimedia signal processing, multimedia communications, and computer vision. IVPL works in a variety of problems (e.g., recovery, compression, segmentation, and speech and speaker recognition) and applications areas (e.g., medical, multi-spectral, and astronomical image processing). Dr. Katsaggelos is a Fellow of the IEEE (1998) and SPIE (2009), the co-inventor of seventeen international patents, the recipient of the IEEE Third Millennium Medal (2000), the IEEE Signal Processing Society Meritorious Service Award (2001), the IEEE Signal Processing Society Technical Achievement Award (2010), and co-author of several award-winning papers.

Personal Website: Visit IVPL Homepage


image00Jack Tumblin

Jack Tumblin is Associate Professor in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. He joined the Department of Computer Science at Northwestern University as an Assistant Professor in September 2001, after two years as a post-Doctoral Associate at the Program of Computer Graphics at Cornell University. He received his PhD in Computer Science in December, 1999 from the Georgia Institute of Technology in the College of Computing advised by Dr. Jessica Hodgins and Dr. Greg Turk at the Graphics, Visualization, and Usability Center. His Research interests include: Computational Photography & Illumination, Computer Vision and Interactive Computer Graphics, High Dynamic Range (HDR) Images and Image Processing, Digital Archives of Visual Appearance for Museum Collections, Human Visual Perception, Psychophysics, and Physiology.

Personal Website: Visit Jack’s Homepage


Marc Walton, D. Phil., Senior Scientist

Marc Walton currently holds the position of Research Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science at Northwestern University. He was trained in Chemistry and Art History at Clark University. He earned a D.Phil. from the University of Oxford in archaeological science following an MA in art history, as well as a diploma in the conservation of works of art, from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. After earning his Ph.D, Marc worked at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for two years prior to joining the Getty Conservation Institute in 2005, where he was an associate scientist responsible for the scientific study of antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum. In addition, he established and ran the analytical laboratory at the Getty Villa site, and served as co-PI on a National Science Foundation Cultural Heritage Science grant on ancient Athenian pottery.  His research has focused primarily on trade and manufacture of ancient objects.

Personal Website: Visit NU-ACCESS Homepage


image03Hooman Mohseni

Hooman Mohseni is Professor in the EECS department at Northwestern University. He runs the The Bio-inspired Sensors and Optoelectronics Lab (BISOL). The lab has a general goal of producing novel photonics and optoelectronic devices inspired by nature. Current research is focused on infrared detectors and vision systems, nano-scale lasers, visible to terahertz plasmonics, and novel nano-processing. BISOL explores physics of nano-scale dimensions to realize novel devices that could revolutionize many medical, commercial, and security applications.

Personal Website: Visit Bisol Homepage