Xiaolei (Alex) Chu

About Me

Actively exploring internship, part-time, and full-time (expected graduation time is December 2026/May 2027, which is flexible) opportunities as a Research Scientist or Machine Learning Engineer in tech. Let’s connect!

I’m a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley, working with Prof. Ziqi Wang. My research interests include LLM post-training, generative models (diffusion and flow matching), and graph learning. I also do research in statistical physics (mean-field theory, renormalization group) and uncertainty quantification. I am always open to research collaborations, especially on LLM and generative models. Please feel free to connect! Before joining Berkeley, I got my master’s degree (with honors) at Tongji University and bachelor’s degree (with honors) at Southwest Jiaotong University.

Outside academia, I like road trips, swimming, hiking, skiing, running, and exploring different restaurants.

Current topics

Multimodal sentiment analysis by fine-tuning LLM (repo here); text-to-image generation by diffusion (portfolio here).

Previous topics

In the spring and summer of 2025, I worked on scientific machine learning methods for spatial-temporal problems. I joined the Scientific Data Division of the Berkeley Lab as a Ph.D. research intern and worked with Prof. Michael Mahoney. We proposed a kinetic theory-based graph learning framework for flow forecasting, e.g., traffic. The paper is under preparation.

In the summer and fall of 2024, I worked on understanding emotion dynamics during hazards. We employed a bottom-up method and constructed the system Hamiltonian. Traditional techniques from statistical physics, such as mean-field theory and the renormalization group, have been widely used to infer macroscopic collective phenomena directly from microscopic interactions. The paper is coming out soon.

Research Interests

Large Language Model: multimodal sentiment analysis (BERT, BLIP, etc.)
Generative Model: diffusion model, flow matching, VAE
Scientific Machine Learning: spatial-temporal forecasting, like PDE
Statistical Physics: mean field theory, renormalization group, equilibrium, non-equilibrium
Uncertainty Quantification: importance sampling, sequential Monte Carlo, Hamiltonian Monte Carlo, surrogate model
Bayesian System Identification: emphasis is on structural health monitoring
Hurricane Simulation: Vickery’s empirical full-track model

Awards

[May. 2025] 2nd Place of Objective Resilience Student Paper/Presentation Competition at EMI 2025, Anaheim, CA, USA
[Aug. 2024] The Professor Alex & Georgia Scordelis Fellowship in Structural Engineering at UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA
[Oct. 2022] Excellent Master’s Thesis at Tongji University, Shanghai, China
[Jun. 2022] Excellent Graduate of Tongji University, Shanghai, China
[Oct. 2021] China National Scholarship, Shanghai, China
[Aug. 2019] Citation for Outstanding College Graduate (summa cum laude), China Civil Engineering Society, Shanghai, China
[Jun. 2019] Excellent Undergraduate of Sichuan Province, Chengdu, China
[Jan. 2019] 1st International Engineering Mechanics Competition: 1st prize for individual competition and 2nd prize for team competition, Nanjing, China
[Apr. 2018] ASCE Steel Bridge Competition: 5th Overall and Best Display Medal (as the group leader), Sacramento, CA, USA
[Oct. 2017] 1st prize in the 9th Chinese Mathematics Competition (CMC), Chengdu, China
[Jul. 2017] 1st prize in the 11th Zhou Peiyuan National Mechanics Competition, Chengdu, China
[Oct. 2016] 1st prize in the 8th Chinese Mathematics Competition (CMC), Chengdu, China
[Sep. 2016-2018] Railway Alumni Scholarship, Chengdu, China

Publications and Projects

RESS

Maximum entropy-based modeling of community-level hazard responses for civil infrastructures

Xiaolei Chu, Ziqi Wang

Reliability Engineering & System Safety, Oct. 2024.
SCHM

Multiscale Time Series Decomposition for Structural Dynamic Properties: Long-Term Trend and Ambient Interference

Xiaolei Chu, Wei Cui, Shengyi Xu, Lin Zhao, Hua Guan, Yaojun Ge

Structural Control and Health Monitoring, Feb. 2023.
ES

Bayesian inference based parametric identification of vortex-excited force using on-site measured vibration data on a long-span bridge

Peng Liu, Xiaolei Chu, Wei Cui, Lin Zhao, Yaojun Ge

Engineering Structures, Sep. 2022.
JSE

Life-Cycle Assessment of Long-Span Bridge’s Wind Resistant Performance Considering Multisource Time-Variant Effects and Uncertainties

Xiaolei Chu, Wei Cui, Lin Zhao, Yaojun Ge

Journal of Structural Engineering, May 2022.
MSSP

Bayesian spectral density approach for identification of bridge section’s flutter derivatives operated in turbulent flow

Xiaolei Chu, Wei Cui, Peng Liu, Lin Zhao, Yaojun Ge

Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing, May 2022.
JWEIA

Probabilistic flutter analysis of a long-span bridge in typhoon-prone regions considering climate change and structural deterioration

Xiaolei Chu, Wei Cui, Lin Zhao, Shuyang Cao, Yaojun Ge

Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics, Aug. 2021.

Services

Journal Reviewers

Journal of Structural Engineering, ASCE
Journal of Engineering
Advanced Engineering Informatics
Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing
Engineering Structures
Measurement
Journal of Building Engineering
Automation in Construction
Reliability Engineering & System Safety

Membership & Activities

[2016-present] Student Member of ASCE