Hey, I’m Leon Zhao — a human-computer interaction researcher and engineer with a background in EECS and design (at least, that’s where I’ve landed for now).
But the 18-year-old me wouldn’t have seen this coming.
In high school, I loved both physics and art but struggled to find ways to connect them. When I started college, my dream was to work in the animation industry. I spent late nights learning Blender, crafting short films frame by frame, and eventually founded WashU’s first animation club — a space for other storytellers like me.
But along the way, I stumbled into something unexpected: I didn’t just want to animate digital worlds. I wanted to build ways to interact with them.
That curiosity led me into extended reality (XR), then to robotics, and eventually to human-computer interaction (HCI). I became fascinated by how the digital and physical could be woven together — not just through pixels, but through sensors, motors, and even sewing machines. I started building wearable systems, experimenting with haptic feedback, and exploring how embodied interfaces could change the way we live, learn, and connect.
It hasn’t always been a straight path. I entered engineering without much technical background and often felt like I was catching up. But that same uncertainty pushed me to explore, combine, and reframe — to make the technical more human, and the human more technical. I learned how to design printed circuit boards, control inverted pendulums, debug Unity errors, and — most importantly — keep storytelling at the heart of it all.
Today, I finally find myself in spaces where design and engineering meet. What ties it all together isn’t just tech — it’s care, curiosity, and a desire to make interactions more intuitive, more embodied, and more felt.
If you're building something that lives between the physical and the digital — something that needs both logic and soul — I’d love to hear about it.
Sept 2025 – Dec 2026
Aug 2021 – May 2025
Jun – Aug 2023
