Prof. Luigi G. Occhipinti
Principal Investigator
Email: lgo23 {at} cam.ac.uk
Luigi Occhipinti, PHD CEng Senior Member IEEE, joined the University of Cambridge in April 2014. He developed science and innovation for more than 25 years in emerging technology areas for the post-CMOS roadmap, smart systems heterogeneous integration, polymer and printed electronics, advanced bio-systems and molecular diagnostics, advanced signal processing and nonlinear computation, advanced mechanical, optical and chemical sensor technologies, with focus on miniaturization and advanced packaging technologies for smart devices and products. He is the Research Professor of Smart Electronics, Biosystems and AI at the Engineering Department, as well as Director of Facilities of the Electrical Engineering Division, the Nanoscience and Cambridge Graphene Centres.
Dr Muzi Xu, PhD Cantab
Research Associate
Email: mx247 {at} cam.ac.uk
Muzi Xu joined the group in 2021 as a PhD student in the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, UK. She passed her viva in 2025 with a PhD Thesis entitled " Biomimetic Biomechanical Sensors for Intelligent Wearable Interfaces". She is a Cambridge Trust Scholar and a member of Trinity College, Cambridge. Before coming to Cambridge, Muzi received her Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering at National University of Singapore.
During her studies, Muzi has been actively involved in aviation and entrepreneurial activities. She is the President of the International Young Scholar Flying Association (IYSFA). She obtained her helicopter pilot’s licence at the age of 17 and was recognised as the youngest female pilot in China at that time.
Dr Chenyu Tang, PhD Cantab
Research Associate
Email: ct631 {at} cam.ac.uk
Chenyu Tang joined the group in 2022 as a PhD student at the University of Cambridge, following the completion of his undergraduate study at Beihang University. He passed his viva in 2025 with a PhD Thesis entitled "AI-driven wearable sensing systems for human-wellbeing". His research interests include the applications of AI-driven wearable systems in healthcare, ranging broadly across healthcare monitoring, speech restoration, human-robot interaction, etc. He has been the first author of more than 10 high-calibre journals such as Nature Communications, PNAS, Nature Sensors, Nature Reviews Electrical Engineering, npj Flexible Electronics, IEEE JBHI, TBME, TNSRE, TIM, etc. Besides, he was invited to author 2 book chapters. In addition to his authorship, he serves the academic community by assuming the role of a reviewer for the Pattern Recognition, IEEE JBHI, IEEE IoTJ, IEEE TCAD, IEEE THMS, etc.
Wentian Yi
Research Assistant, PhD Candidate
Email: wy278 {at} cam.ac.uk
Wentian Yi is a PhD student in Engineering and a member of Cambridge Graphene Centre. He has previously conducted research on degradable thermoset polymer for the reduction of e-waste during his undergraduate degree. After receiving his BSc degree in Chemistry from Renmin University of China in 2021, he finished his MRes course in soft electronic materials at Imperial College London. During this time, he grew interested in fibre electronics and focused on polymer fibre embedding in two-dimensional materials.
His current research in Occhipinti group is focusing on the synthesis of polymer composite embedding nanomaterials and the scale-up fabrication of fibre-based photodetectors. His research interest lies in fibre electronics and smart textile that will pave the way for the coming Internet of Things.
Gavin Summers
PhD Candidate
Email: grs50 {at} cam.ac.uk
Gavin received his M.Eng. in Electrical and Electronic Engineering in 2019 from Newcastle University where his dissertation focused on the characterisation of thermoelectric materials. Following on from an internship during his undergraduate studies he then started working as a specialist in smart home and electronics at Beko PLC's research and development centre in Cambridge. As a Ph.D. student he will focus on developing a scalable multi-analyte platform for biomolecules with a view towards industrialisation.
Tasnim Chowdhury
PhD Student
Email: tnc24 {at} cam.ac.uk
Tasnim is a final year PhD student in Occhipinti’s group, working on flexible and wearable electronics, using sustainable materials. After graduating from Newcastle University with an honours degree in Medicinal Chemistry, Tasnim worked in various roles at a fast paced pharmaceutical CDMO in Alnwick, Northumberland with world class facilities and industry leading scientists. She is highly experienced in HPLC, drug formulation and development, GLP and GMP processes.
During her PhD she has led two award-winning research proposals for the CAPE Grand Challenge in 2021 (SP-Destress) and in 2022 (CamBalance), sponsored by GSK and Haleon, respectively. Tasnim is currently leading the industrial partnership project with Haleon to develop a mobile application with a smart companion device for monitoring physiological changes in menopausal people. She has a passion for innovating in the field of women’s (trans and nonbinary) health, mental health and sustainable materials.
Josée Mallah
PhD Student
Email: jm2508 {at} cam.ac.uk
Josée is a PhD in Engineering student, as a member of Churchill College, Cambridge. She is the recipient of an Allen, Meek and Read Cambridge International Scholarship. Her project focuses on biomechanical data collection and exoskeleton design for walking assistance in older people.
She graduated with high distinction from the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik (USEK) in Lebanon, being ranked first among her cohort with a CGPA of 95.28% and a full scholarship recipient. Her final project consisted in designing an Active Prosthesis for Transtibial Amputees.
In 2023, Josée completed the MPhil in Engineering with the Occhipinti Group on a full scholarship. Her thesis was entitled “Modelling and Design of Silicon-Based Platforms for Multimodal Air Quality Monitoring”. In 2022, she was an intern at the UNDP Regional Hub for Arab States, supporting the Nature, Climate and Energy team.
Josée was recognized one of the Top Outstanding Young Persons of Lebanon (TOYP) 2022, by JCI Lebanon and UNIC Beirut, in the category of Academic Leadership and/or Achievement. She is also inspired by entrepreneurship, and was developing a startup project, Aquatricity, which aimed to help people optimize their water and energy consumption through smart metering and awareness raising.
Francisco Quero
PhD Student
Email: fjq21 {at} cam.ac.uk
Fran Quero studied Biotechnology at the Complutense University of Madrid and then completed the BIO3 MRes at Tsinghua University. During his undergraduate studies, Fran helped create the first open citizen biomakerspaces in Madrid (BioCrea, Medialab Prado) and later at Tsinghua University ( Bio-X-Space, OpenFIESTA faculty), and led the Madrid iGEM team for two years (2018 and 2019). After completing his master's degree, Fran worked as the lead research engineer for the DNA Detective project at the Systems Engineering and Evolution Dynamics (SEED) Lab in Paris, where he developed electronic and biotechnology tools and applied them in Cameroon, Ghana, and Patagonia for environmental sampling, pathogen detection in agriculture, and human pathogen environmental screening - with this last work becoming a XPRIZE semifinalist. Currently, Fran's PhD research focuses on integrating digital microfluidic technologies with cell-free systems as a novel artificial cell model, providing a scalable approach for bottom-up engineering of cellular biology.
Dimitrios Paparas
PhD Student
Email: dp741 {at} cam.ac.uk
Dimitrios Paparas joined the OcchipintiGroup as a PhD student in 2024. He holds a BEng in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from the University of Southampton and an MSc in Robotics and Autonomous Systems from the University of Lincoln, achieving First-Class Honours in both programmes.Following his BEng, Dimitrios became part of the AgriFoRwArdS Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT), a UKRI EPSRC-funded initiative established by the University of Lincoln, in collaboration with the University of Cambridge and University of East Anglia, to develop expertise in the agri-food robotics sector. During his MSc, Dimitrios worked extensively on Open-Source Hardware (OSH) Whisker Sensors for tactile-sensing applications. His MSc thesis, however, focused on detecting early signs of graft failure in tomato plants through computer vision-based techniques for non-invasive sensing, forming the foundation for his current research.Dimitrios’ PhD, supervised by Dr Luigi Occhipinti and conducted in collaboration with Dyson Farming, centres on the development of biosensors for "In-Field Plant Diagnostics and Physiology Monitoring." His research explores the integration of biosensing, machine learning, and robotics to enable plant health monitoring, with objectives including early disease detection and tracking of physiological processes such as healing, ripening, and senescence.The research addresses critical gaps between industry needs and cutting-edge agricultural science, aligning with the AgriFoRwArdS CDT’s focus on sensing and perception. Additionally, Dimitrios’ work investigates synergies with ongoing CDT projects in mobile diagnostics, plant-based sensors, and interactive sensing, with practical applications in areas such as fruit harvesting.
Zibo Zhang
PhD Student
Email: zz534 {at} cam.ac.uk
Zibo Zhang joined the Occhipinti Group in 2024 as a PhD student. His academic background includes a Master’s degree in Integrated Machine Learning Systems from University College London and a Bachelor’s degree in Reliability and Systems Engineering from Beihang University. He has been involved in research across a range of fields, from predictive analytics for engineering systems to wearable technologies, gaining valuable experience in developing innovative solutions for complex challenges. His current research focuses on smart wearable devices, with a particular interest in the healthcare sector. He is dedicated to creating multi-sensor, multi-modal, and multi-functional systems that can adapt to various medical applications. The future potential of wearable technologies in improving health monitoring, diagnostics, and personalised care is central to his work, and he remains committed to advancing this field through practical innovations that can enhance patient outcomes and well-being.
Wanzhexi Yang
PhD Student
Email: wy291 {at} cam.ac.uk
Wanzhexi joined the Occhipinti Group in October 2025 as a PhD student. He holds a Master’s degree in Bioengineering from Imperial College London and a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacology (Bioscience) from University College London. His Bachelor’s thesis investigated endothelial dysfunction in Type II diabetes, reviewing endothelium biology and disease mechanisms. During his Master’s project, he designed and built ion-sensing electrodes for potassium and lithium for a continuous monitoring platform.
His PhD project aims to develop an immune-based electrochemical biosensor for the early detection of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma (NPC) at point-of-care (POC) settings.
Vivian Dianne Li
PhD Student
Email: vdl21 {at} cam.ac.uk
Vivian Li is a PhD student in Engineering and a member of St. Catharine's College. She obtained her bachelor's degree and MEng in Computer Science from the University of Cambridge in 2024. She has previously conducted research in the application of artificial intelligence models to a variety of fields, including Bayesian models of human visual perception, Gaussian models for MRI structural connectivity, graph neural networks for protein modelling, and vision transformers for the automated segmentation of cryogenic electron tomography.
Her current research in the Occhipinti group is on the development of wearable brain-computer interfaces for health monitoring and rehabilitation, with a general focus on the interface between artificial intelligence and non-invasive neurotechnology.
Agastasya Dahiya
MPhil Student
Email: ad2344 {at} cam.ac.uk
Agastasya Dahiya is an MPhil in Engineering student with a focus on hand gesture recognition technologies. He joined the Occhipinti Group in 2024, initially as a visiting student from Bennett University, India, and returned in 2025 after graduation as an MPhil student. His recent project involves designing a wearable system using IR sensors for gesture detection, focusing on applications for individuals with limited muscle movement. Previously, he worked on a wearable hand gesture recognition system using an IMU sensor, combining accelerometer and gyroscope data for precise motion tracking. In addition to gesture recognition, Agastasya has worked on RTL design of RISC-V processors, voice conversion using machine learning, and navigation control for robots.
Orestis Kaparounakis
PhD Student
Email: ok302 {at} cam.ac.uk
Orestis Kaparounakis began his PhD in Engineering in 2021 with the Physical Computation Laboratory under Prof. Phillip Stanley-Marbell and is now a member of the Occhipinti Group. He holds an MEng in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, where his thesis introduced a compilation system for backpropagation-enabled extended Kalman filters based on physical system descriptions. His research studies how data uncertainty affects state estimation algorithms and develops methods for real-time uncertainty tracking. Recent work explores epistemic uncertainty in calibrated sensors and techniques for computing intractable likelihoods in particle filtering. He is funded by an EPSRC DTP studentship.
Jennie Couchman
PhD Student
Email: jlr71 {at} cam.ac.uk
Jennie Couchman is a final year Ph.D. student who joined the Engineering department as part of Dr. Phillip Stanley-Marbell's Physical Computation Laboratory and is now part of the Occhipinti group. She received a dual B.S. Degree in Electrical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 2010 and an M.S. Degree in Electrical Engineering from Northeastern University in 2019. Jennie also has multiple years of industry experience in the defense and bioelectronics sectors. Her Ph.D. research is focused on analyzing how measurement uncertainty propagates through Brain-Computer Interface signal processing chains.
Yunqi Zhang
PhD Student
Email: yz795 {at} cam.ac.uk
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Dominika Kazieczko
MPhil Student
Email: dk720 {at} cam.ac.uk
Dominika graduated from Cardiff University with a bachelor’s in Electrical and Electronic Engineering with a Year in Industry. She completed a placement year with Össur Touch Bionics in Scotland where Dominka worked on surface EMG sensors’ data processing, improvement of prosthesis control, design of test rigs for verification of functionality of the bionic devices and automation of the testing setups. This was followed by a summer placement at Cardiff University focusing on the integration of microcontrollers to detect early stages of osteoarthritis, where she designed and manufactured PCB boards and mechanical enclosures and programmed the devices’ control to deliver a wearable system ready for official study data collection in MSKBRF lab.
The bachelor thesis focused on development of a silicone-based skin phantom mimicking the dielectric properties of this tissue to achieve a stable platform for verification of the wearable microwave non-invasive glucose sensor, developed at Cardiff University in collaboration with the UK-based company GlucoRX. For this project Dominika was awarded the Emrys Williams Prize for Outstanding Electrical and Electronic Engineering Final Year Project.
She was also awarded the IET Future Talent Award in 2024.
Eric Nilsson
IIB Project Student
Email: en378 {at} cam.ac.uk
Bruno Iwanczyk
IIB Project Student
Email: bi231 {at} cam.ac.uk
Qian Shen
Master Student,
Department of Engineering, U. Cambridge
Email: qs230 {at} cam.ac.uk
Academic Visitors
Luyao Jin
Phd Student, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Email: lj456 {at} cam.ac.uk
Luyao Jin joins the group in 2025 as a visiting PhD student.
Luyao is a PhD student from the Department of Mechanism and Automation Engineering, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research focuses on motor decoding, brain-computer interface, and machine learning.
Alumni/
Dr Fangxin Hu
Visiting Professor (2024-25)
Fang Xin Hu joined the Occhipintigroup in 2024 as an academic visitor. She is an associate professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering, Suzhou University of Science and Technology Her research involves developing Integrated single-atom nanozyme based biochip-electronic System for in situ electrochemical or photoelectrochemical detection of various biomolecules.
Yu Zhu
Visiting PhD Student (2024-25)
Yu joined the group in October 2024 from Aalborg University, Denmark, as an academic visitor to work on the development of novel control systems that utilise wearable sensors for the exoskeleton.
Tharun Reddy Kandukuri
PhD Student (2020-25)
Tharun joined the group in 2020 from Binghamton University, USA and graduated in 2025 with a PhD Thesis entitled "AI-assisted Development of Energy Harvesters for Point-Of-Care Testing".
![IMG_4337[9]_edited.jpg](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/a867b3_d627c6cf47bc4fe490459cbd527ebcee~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_126,h_126,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_avif,quality_auto/IMG_4337%5B9%5D_edited.jpg)
Silas Ruhrberg Estevez
Research Project Student (2024)
Dr Caizhi Liao
Postdoctoral Researcher (2024-25)
Caizhi Liao, PhD, joined the Occhipinti Group as a Research Associate in June 2024. He obtained his PhD from the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (AIBN) at the University of Queensland in 2020. He has over 12 years of research and management experience in the fields of innovative biosensors and bioelectronics. Prior to joining the University of Cambridge, he worked as a founding Research and Development (R&D) Director of a unicorn biotech company-Creative Biosciences, leading research teams developing cutting-edge biomedical diagnostics devices. Caizhi serves as the Editor of Scientifica (Wiley), the Associate Editor of the Journal of Biomedical and Life Sciences, the Guest Editors of many highly reputed journals, and the Editorial Board Member of dozens of other scientific journals. In addition, Caizhi served as the Committee Chair and Technical Committee Member of dozens of international conferences. His research projects in Cambridge focus on using transistor array based digital microfluidics for point-of-care (POC) diagnostics..
Ioannis Prattis
PhD Student (2019-23)
Ioannis completed his PhD student in the OcchipintiGroup, Department of Engineering in 2023. His PhD project was sponsored via an EPSRC studentship with industrial support by Cambridge Display Technologies Ltd. focusing on the development of novel biosensing platforms for cancer detection, aiming to transform the current biopsy procedures.
Joshua Abu
Research Project Student (2022-23)
Dr Xiaohui Zhou, MD PhD
Visiting Professor (2024-25)
Dr. Xiaohui Zhou joined our team as a visiting scholar in October 2024 from China Pharmaceutical University. His research work focused on implantable Active Stimulation and Drug delivery (ASD) devices for the heart..
Chenxhuan Hu
Visiting PhD Student (2024-25)
Chenxuan was a visiting PhD student in 2024. She studied biomedical engineering at University of Science and Technology of China. Her current research focuses on single cell detection and analysis on the large area active matrix digital microfluidics platform.
Dafydd Ravenscroft
PhD Student (2020-25)
Dafydd joined the group in 2020 from the EPSRC CDT in Sensors Technologies and Applications and graduated in 2025 with a PhD Thesis entitled "Design and Development of Emerging Platforms for Personal Healthcare".
Pelumi Oluwasanya
PhD Student (2016-20)
Pelumi joined the group in 2016 from the EPSRC CDT in Sensors Technologies and Applications and graduated in 2020 with a PhD Thesis entitled "Portable and Non-Intrusive Sensors for Monitoring Air Pollution: PM2.5 and NO2".
Abdul Alzahran
Postdoctoral Researcher (2017-19)
Xiang Cheng
Postdoctoral Researcher (2018-19)
Varindra Kumar
Postdoctoral Researcher (2018-19)
Edward Tan
PhD Student (2015-19)
Miguel Monteiro
Research Project Student (2018)
Nuno Bartolo
Research Project Student (2018)
