Research

I’ve broken down my work by various themes, as my interests have evolved quite a bit over the course of my academic career.

Political Economy of Tech

My current research explores the privatization of digitally-supported infrastructure and its implications on inequalities of access and distribution. I am wrapping up a project on Uber in Los Angeles. More to come here!

Positive Computing

I worked with Professor Gloria Mark and scholar Yu Chen to design psychological interventions to improve and better understand student well-being through the use of computing technology (smartphones) that are already ubiquitous.

Chen, Y., Mark, G., Ali, S., and Ma, X. (2017). Unpacking Happiness: Lessons from Smartphone Photography among College Students. Proceedings of The Fifth IEEE International Conference on Healthcare Informatics (ICHI 2017).
Chen, Y., Mark, G., and Ali, S. (2016). Promoting Positive Affect through Smartphone Photography. Special Issue on Positive Computing: A new partnership between psychology, the social sciences, and technology, Psychology of Well-Being: Theory, Research and Practice. June 2016.

Biotech & Society

As an undergraduate, I was fascinated by the computing-inspired transformations in biological research as they manifested in the then-nascent fields of genomics and synthetic biology. As an STS major, I sought to understand the social implications of these technological innovations. This culminated in two projects:

“Unlocking the Power of Your Genome: Financial and Regulatory Challenges”
Undergraduate Honors Thesis evaluates challenges of bringing genomics from lab to consumer through case studies of corporate business models and policy analysis.
- Advised by Professor Russ Altman, Chair of Bioengineering at Stanford.
- Awarded Firestone Medal for Excellence in Research
- PDF available here. Wordle below!

thesis wordcloud

“Debating a Proposed Moratorium on Synthetic Biology Research”
Essay explores the ethical issues and risks surrounding the public policy debate of imposing a moratorium on synthetic biology research.
- Published in Intersect: The Stanford Journal of Science, Technology, and Society, Vol. 5 (2012).
- Available here.