About

Welcome! My name is Yutong Ren, a first-year PhD student at Virginia Tech, advised by Prof. Doug A. Bowman and a member of the 3D Interaction Group.

Previously, I received my M.S. in Information Science from the University of Michigan, where I was advised by Prof. Michael Nebeling. I received my B.S. in Data Science from Duke Kunshan University.

My research focuses on AI-driven XR systems that understand and adapt to human behavior. I study how immersive systems can use signals such as eye tracking, interaction data, audio features, and environmental context to infer users’ cognitive and affective states in real time. This work is grounded in three questions:

1. How can XR systems model user states such as boredom, attention, distraction, and engagement from multimodal data?
2. How can AI reason about these states in relation to task and environmental context?
3. How can XR systems respond with adaptive interventions that improve human performance, engagement, and safety while preserving user agency?

Timeline

• Apr. 2026 Our work on fast and accurate real-world object selection with peripheral AR displays is headed to CHI 2026 in Barcelona!
• Aug. 2025 Joined Virginia Tech as a PhD student.