Our Research Team

We are committed to being a diverse, inclusive, and collaborative team of researchers. For more information about our work, please visit our research page. Additionally, feel free to join our weekly reading group open to anyone interested in reading about and discussing trending topics in software engineering (contact Dr. Brown for details).

Dr. Chris Brown Faculty	Yoseph Alebachew Berhanu PhD Student	Dibyendu Brinto Bose PhD Student 💼	Aninditaa Chauhan MS Student 💼
Jason Cusati PhD Student	Xiaoxiao Gan PhD Student	Shawal Khalid PhD Student 💼	Minhyuk Ko PhD Student
Hunter Leary PhD Student	Huayu Liang PhD Student	Swanand Vaishampayan PhD Student 💼	Tianjia Wang PhD Student 💼

💼 Students currently on the job market! Please contact Dr. Brown for more details.

---

Alumni

Name	Degree	Thesis /  Project	Last Known Job
Arpit Thool	Ph.D. (2026)	“Bridging Security and Agility: A Comprehensive Approach to Integrating Security Practices in Agile Development through DAST, LLMs, and Automation”	Adobe
Sahar Farzanehpour	M.S. (2025)	“Enhancing Learning Algorithms on YouTube: A Personalized Educational System, EduTube AI”	TBD
PeiQing Guo	M.S. (2025)	“Reimagining Graduate Academic Planning: A User-Centered Web Application for the Plan of Study Process”	TBD
Swetha Rajeev	M.S. (2025)	Bridging the Gap in Software Engineering Education: Analyzing Learning Behaviors, Challenges, and Resource Effectiveness in Full-Stack Development”	Capital One
Tian-Yu (Edward) Shiung	M.S. (2025)	“Are Bigger LLMs Always Better? A Study of Open and Closed-Source Models in Code Generation and Translation”	Start-Up
Huayu Liang	M.S. (2024)	“Understanding User and Developer Perceptions of Dark Patterns in Online Environments”	PhD at VT
Md Mahim Haque	M.S. (2023)	“FixEval: Execution-based Evaluation of Program Fixes for Competitive Programming Problems”	Luminary AI
Nivishree Palvannan	M.S. (2023)	“Impact of Using Suggestion Bot While Code Reviewing”	Torc Robotics
Ryan Wood	M.S. (2023)	“Understanding the Impact of Dark Pattern Detection on Online Users”	Peraton
Lucas Franke	M.S. (2023)	“Understanding the Impact of Data Privacy Regulations on Software and Its Stakeholders”	IBM
Brian Bell	M.S. (2023)	“Understanding the Preparation Phase of Technical Interviews”	Kinsale Insurance
Sean Gruber	M.S. (2023)	“Gaps in Software Engineering Education”	Peraton

Undergraduate Interns

Name	Institution	Year
Cheerayu Kapoor	Virginia Tech	Spring 2026 -- present
Md Azfar Hasan	Virginia Tech	Spring 2026 -- present
Harshaan Tank	Virginia Tech	Spring 2026 -- present
Luke Hanuska	Virginia Tech	Fall 2025 -- present
Victoria Rusaeva	Virginia Tech	Fall 2025 -- present
Jiawei (David) Qin	Virginia Tech	Fall 2025 -- present
Aidan Nguyen	Virginia Tech	Fall 2025
Joaquin Tuckett	Virginia Tech	MAOP 2025
Rayn Owens	Virginia State	MAOP 2025
Rishan Biju	Virginia Tech	Fall 2024, Fall 2025
James Barber	Virginia Tech	Fall 2024-Spring 2025
Dan McCabe	Virginia Tech	Fall 2024-Spring 2025
Travis Chan	Virginia Tech	MAOP 2024
Javier Ralat	Virginia Tech	MAOP 2024
Syeda Afia Hossain	Virginia Tech	CEED 2024
Yasmin Tanyu	Virginia Tech	Fall 2023-Spring 2024
Matthew Trimble	Virginia Tech	Fall 2023-Spring 2024
Omer Ahmed	Virginia Tech	MAOP 2023
Edwin Lewis II	Morehouse College	MAOP 2023
Colin Roberts	Virginia Tech	MAOP 2023
Jenna Krebs	Virginia Tech	Spring 2023
Grace Govan	Virginia Tech	Fall 2022-Spring 2023