About

Photo taken in 2023 at Dali

I’m Xiaohan Yan (颜啸晗 in Chinese), originally from Tai’an, Shandong. My parents were first-generation college graduates from rural China. Very much knowing the value of higher education, they supported me to pursue my studies in the States.

I went to University of Washington from 2009 to 2013, where I developed a passion for statistics just as the Big Data era was unfolding. After taking advanced statistics courses, I had an aspiration to delve deeper into statistical models and theory. As an undergrad, I engaged in research on China’s energy efficiency, funded by the Mary Gates Endowment scholarship. This pivotal experience carved my path as a statistician.

From 2013 to 2018 I pursued my PhD study at Cornell University Department of Statistics and Data Science. I was very fortunate to be advised by Jacob Bien, and Martin T. Wells and Thorsten Joachims were also on my committee. My PhD research focused on developing novel convex optimization models for achieving desirable structural patterns in model parameters. Parallel to academic pursuits, I gathered work experiences in tech firms through internships (which also supplemented my modest graduate student stipend.) Post-PhD, I joined Microsoft as a Data Scientist and moved back to Seattle.

I am working as a Tech Lead for my team in Microsoft Azure Core. My primary role involves enhancing AI/ML analytical solutions for large-scale cloud infrastructure, particularly in AIOps. My aim is ensuring Azure’s service quality through detecting/attributing/mitigating platform issues in cloud computing. I actively lead collaborations between my team and research units, such as Microsoft Research.

Outside work, residing by Lake Washington’s East Side, I relish reading, gardening, and engaging in sports with loved ones.