Faculty
Burcin Becerik-Gerber
Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber is a professor and Chair of Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and founder and the Director of USC Center for Intelligent Environments (CENTIENTS). During the last 15 years, her research focused on advanced data acquisition, modeling, visualization for design, construction, and control of user-centered responsive and adaptive built environments. She pioneered a new field: Human-Building Interaction (HBI), which is a convergent field that represents the growing complexities of the dynamic interplay between human experience and intelligence within built environments. She published her work in more than 200 peer-reviewed journal and conference papers. Her work has received support worth over $15 million from a variety of sources, including the NSF, DoE, DHS and DoT and corporate sponsors. In 2012, she was named by the MIT’s Technology Review as one of the top 35 technology innovators under the age of 35 (first civil engineering faculty to receive this recognition). She received the FIATECH Celebration of Engineering and Technology Innovation Award in 2018. The same year, she was awarded the Rutherford Visiting Fellowship by the Alan Turing Institute, UK’s national data science and AI institute.
Between 2012-2019, she held the inaugural Stephen Schrank Early Career Chair. In 2020, she was appointed as a USC Viterbi Dean's Professor. In 2021, she was elected to the National Academy of Construction. Since 2021, she serves on the Board on Infrastructure and the Constructed Environment of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She received mentoring and leadership recognitions such as the Mellon Mentoring Award (2017) and an Executive Leadership in Academic Technology, Engineering and Science (ELATES) Fellowship (2021), which speak to her commitment to education and leadership in academia. In 2022, she received an Emmy Award as a co-producer of the documentary, “Lives, Not Grades,” which told the story of a novel course, she co-designed and co-taught, that focused on engineering innovation for global challenges. In 2023, she received ASCE’s Computing in Civil Engineering Award and in 2024, she received ASCE’s Peurifoy Construction Research Award and Henry L. Michel Award for Industry Advancement of Research.
Dr. Becerik-Gerber holds degrees in both Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture. She graduated from Istanbul Technical University with a Bachelor of Architecture (1999) and an M.S. in Architecture (2001). She attended the University of California at Berkeley, where she received an M.S. in Engineering degree (2002) with a special focus on Construction Engineering and Management. She earned her Doctor of Design degree (2006) from Harvard University. Her doctoral work at Harvard University focused on online collaboration and project management. Upon completing her doctoral degree, she worked as a consultant and taught in the area. Her responsibilities included development of corporate-wide program management information systems for large and complex construction projects. In 2008, she joined the Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.
Email: becerik@usc.edu
Lucio Soibelman
Dr. Lucio Soibelman is a Professor at the Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Southern California. He also serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Advanced Engineering Informatics and as co-chief editor for the ASCE Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering. Dr. Soibelman’s research focuses on use of information technology for economic development, information technology support for construction management, process integration during the development of large-scale engineering systems, information logistics, artificial intelligence, data mining, knowledge discovery, image reasoning, text mining, machine learning, multi-reasoning mechanisms, sensors, sensor networks, and advanced infrastructure systems.
Dr. Soibelman joined USC in 2012 after more than seven years as professor of civil and environmental engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. His academic career began six years previously at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he became associate professor. He earned his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering Systems (1998) from Massachusetts Institute of Technology after 10 years of experience in private industry in his native Brazil.
During the last 12 years Dr. Soibelman published over 100 books, books chapters, journal papers, conference articles, and reports and performed research with funding from NSF, NASA, DOE, US Army, NIST, IBM, Bosch, IDOT, RedZone Robotics among many other funding agencies. Dr. Soibelman received the NSF CAREER Award in 2001, the 2010 ASCE Computing in Civil Engineering Award and the FIATECH Outstanding Researcher Celebration of Engineering & Technology Innovation, or CETI, Award. During the last 2 years he has been collaborating with ADEPT to provide consulting services on BIM implementation to several large construction companies in Brazil.
Email: soibelman@usc.edu
Current Researchers
Current Researchers
Ruying Liu
Ruying is a postdoctoral researcher by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber. She earned her bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Edinburgh, Master’s degree in Structural Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley and her PhD from the University of Southern California. She worked as a structural designer at Rutherford Chekene before joining the Sonny Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering to pursue her PhD degree. Ruying loves reading and calligraphy.
Degree Pursued: Postdoctoral Researcher
Email: ruyingli@usc.edu
Research Interests: Smart & Autonomous Built Environments, Human-Building Interaction
Mirmahdi Seyedrazaei
Mirmahdi Seyedrezaei is a Ph.D. candidate in Civil & Environmental Engineering at the University of Southern California (USC), advised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber. He holds a B.S. and M.S. in Civil Engineering from Sharif University of Technology (2016, 2018), as well as an M.S. in Sustainable Engineering from USC (2025). His research focuses on human-building interaction, multidomain indoor environmental quality (IEQ), and occupant-centered design strategies that promote healthier built environments tailored to the diverse needs of building occupants. Outside of research, Mirmahdi enjoys traveling, hiking, biking, and catching sunsets.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: seyedrez@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-building interaction; multidomain IEQ; occupant-centered design; human adaptive built environment.
Antonin Brun
Antonin is a third-year PhD student advised by Burçin Becerik-Gerber at USC. His research bridges interaction design, human-computer interaction (HCI), and architecture, with a focus on adaptive architectural interventions for office worker well-being. Antonin earned his Bachelor degree in Bioresource Engineering from McGill University (2020) and a Master’s in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Stanford (2023). As an avid surfer, Antonin loves to spend his free time riding waves.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: abrun@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-Building Interaction, Interactive Design, Innovative Technology Adoption, Building Energy Efficiency
Tao Zang
Tao Zang is a PhD student supervised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in civil engineering at the University of Illinois (2021), and a Master’s in Civil Engineering from University of California, Berkeley (2022). After graduation, he worked as a practicing structural engineer for two years at SOM. He is passionate about intelligent built environment, human-building interaction, and construction automation. During free time, he enjoys hiking, table tennis, biking, and watching movies.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: taozang@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-building interaction, Computer vision, Healthy Buildings
Mireya Reyes
Mireya Reyes is a PhD student supervised by Dr. Burçin Becerik-Gerber. She earned her bachelor's degree in Engineering, with a Civil and Environmental Engineering concentration from Wake Forest University (2024). She joined USC to pursue her PhD in Civil Engineering. Mireya loves practicing yoga, hiking, singing, and spending time with her pet rabbit.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: mireyare@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-Building Interaction, Social Justice, Inclusive Design
Zicheng Han
Zicheng is a Ph.D. student supervised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber. He earned his bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering from Tongji University in China, and his dual master's degree focused on Information Technology in Civil Engineering from Tongji University and Nagoya Institute of Technology in Japan. He joined USC in the Fall of 2024 to pursue his Ph.D. in the field of Civil Engineering. Zicheng enjoys playing the guitar, playing table tennis and traveling in his spare time.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: hanziche@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-Building Interactions, Building Information Modeling, Computer Vision, Deep Learning
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Joseph Mondragon Vargas
Joseph is a Ph.D. student supervised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber. He earned his bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering from Boise State University. He has participated in several research projects, including climate change resilience, computational simulation of materials, machine learning, and data analysis of skewed datasets. He loves math and was a math tutor for three years while getting his bachelor’s degree. After attending the summer research program at Stanford University, he was gripped by the immense possibilities of civil engineering as a means of addressing the current challenges that humanity faces. He joined USC in the fall of 2025 to pursue his Ph.D. in Civil & Environmental Engineering, looking forward to actively contributing to the stewardship of the built environment. Joseph enjoys observing nature’s expressions, believing they hold insights that can help solve engineering challenges.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: jamondra@usc.edu
Research Interests: Big data in civil engineering
Yuxin Yang
Yuxin is a PhD student under the supervision of Dr. Burçin Becerik-Gerber. She earned her bachelor's degree in Building Environment and Energy Application Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology and a master's degree in Architecture Technology from Shanghai Jiao Tong University. She is passionate about modelling human activities in built environment. In her leisure time, Yuxin enjoys reading, swimming, playing tennis, and trying new sports.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: yyang741@usc.edu
Research Interests: Human-Building Interaction, Data Mining, Multi-Agent Simulation
Shanshan Jiang
Shanshan Jiang is a Ph.D. student co-supervised by Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber and Dr. Lucio Soibelman. She earned her bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Tongji University in China and later completed her master’s degree in Civil Engineering Information Technology at Tongji University. She joined USC in the Fall of 2025 to pursue her Ph.D. in Civil Engineering. In her free time, she enjoys traveling, reading, and painting.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: sjiang24@usc.edu
Research Interests: Smart & Autonomous Built Environments, Human-Robot Interaction, Building Information Modeling
Wenbo Zhang
Wenbo is a PhD student in Civil Engineering at USC, advised by Dr. Burçin Becerik-Gerber and Dr. Soibelman. He holds a Bachelor’s in Architecture from Tianjin University (2015), a Master of Architecture from Cornell University (2016), and a Master in Design Engineering from Harvard University (2024). He joined USC in Fall 2025 to pursue his PhD in Civil Engineering. His research focuses on integrating material innovation, computational design, and human-centered HCI to improve sustainability and quality of life in the built environment. As a former chef, Wenbo enjoys cooking, playing sports such as tennis and badminton, gaming, and traveling in his free time.
Degree Pursued: PhD in Civil Engineering
Email: wzhang42@usc.edu
Research Interests: Computational design, Material Innovation & Fabrication, Human-centered HCI, Sustainable Human-building Interaction