I am a PhD candidate at University of Toronto Faculty of Information, advised by Professor
Christoph Becker.
My research interests are: human-computer interaction, design and data exploration support.
My recent projects explore how people engage with urban data, visualizations, and
data exploration tools for sensemaking, storytelling, and decision-making as they imagine and
pursue sustainable urban futures.
I am particularly interested in how design and creative practices can make data more contextual,
experiential, and relatable.
In 2021, I worked with two amazing mentors Professor Lydia Chilton and Vivian Liu at the Columbia University Computational
Design Lab. This has been an incredible experience for me to delve a little bit deeper into human-AI interaction and
creativity support tools.
I have since continued to explore my interests in supporting creative practitioners through research internships at Autodesk Research (2023-24)
and Adobe Research (2026).
I graduated from Wellesley College,
studying mathematics and Media Arts and Sciences (cs + design).
I then obtained my MSc in Urban Planning from the University of Pennsylvania
Weitzman School of Design.
Publications
(* equal contribution)
Han Qiao, Rowan O.A. Munson, Nadia Mariyan Smith, Eshta Bhardwaj, Christoph Becker
Creativity and Cognition 2026
Han Qiao, Siyi Wu, Christoph Becker
CSCW 2025 🏆 Best Paper Award
Han Qiao, Jo Vermeulen, George Fitzmaurice, Justin Matejka
CHI 2025
Pathways to urban sustainability: Design perspectives on a data curation and visualization platform
Eshta Bhardwaj*, Han Qiao*, Christoph Becker
Computing within Limits 2023
Opal: Multimodal Image Generation for News Illustration
Vivian Liu, Han Qiao, Lydia B. Chilton
UIST 2022
Initial Images: Using Image Prompts to Improve Subject Representation in Multimodal AI Generated Art
Han Qiao, Vivian Liu, Lydia B. Chilton
Creativity and Cognition 2022
News Log
🇬🇧 July. 2026: Presented our work at the JSD lab on Save the AI at C&C.
💻 May. 2026: Started my internship at Adobe Research, working on creativity support.
🏆 Jan. 2026: Received the Sustainable Development Goals Student Award.
🇳🇴 Nov. 2025: Presented our work at the JSD lab on Near Data and Far Data at CSCW.
🇯🇵 Apr. 2025: Presented our work with Autodesk Research at CHI.
🏆 Mar. 2025: Received School of Cities Urban Challenge 4.0 Grant.
💻 Sep. 2024: Back to the Ontario Government as a Data + UX intern.
💻 Sep. 2023: Started my internship at Autodesk Research, working with the HCI and Vis Team.
🏆 Jun. 2023: Received Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society Fellowship.
💻 May. 2023: Started my internship at Ontario Digital Service, working on AI accountability.
🏆 Oct. 2022: Received Digital Curation Institute Fellowship.