Ayano Hiranaka
Curriculum Vitae# ahiranak@usc.edu
 misoshiruseijin.github.io/

Research Interests
My research interest lies in developing robots that communicate and collaborate effectively with humans toincrease the quality of human lives, while also evolving alongside humans. I am passionate to develop robots
with human-like, generalizable understanding of the world, ability to learn through human interactions, versatile
manipulation and mobility capabilities, and safe and friendly behaviors.

Education
2024–current PhD in Computer Science, University of Southern California
2021–2023 MS in Mechanical Engineering, Stanford UniversityGPA: 4.02/4.30
2016–2019 BS in Mechanical Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
GPA: 3.98/4.00, Graduation with Highest Honors

Conference Publications*: denotes equal contribution, † : denotes equal contribution, alphabetically orderedpaper
websitepaper
websitepaperwebsite

NOIR: Neural Signal Operated Intelligent Robots for Everyday Activities
Ruohan Zhang*, Sharon Lee*, Minjune Hwang*, Ayano Hiranaka*, Chen Wang, Wensi Ai, Jin
Jie Ryan Tan, Shreya Gupta, Yilun Hao, Gabrael Levine, Ruohan Gao, Anthony Norcia, Li Fei-Fei,Jiajun Wu
Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), 2023
Primitive Skill-based Robot Learning from Human Evaluative Feedback
Ayano Hiranaka† , Minjune Hwang† , Sharon Lee, Chen Wang, Li Fei-Fei, Jiajun Wu, RuohanZhang
International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 2023
A Dual Representation Framework for Robot Learning with Human GuidanceRuohan Zhang*, Dhruva Bansal*, Yilun Hao*, Ayano Hiranaka, Jialu Gao, Chen Wang, Roberto
Martin-Martin, Li Fei-Fei, Jiajun Wu
Conference on Robot Learning (CoRL), 2022
Best paper award at Aligning Robot Representations with Humans workshop

Research Experiences
Dec 2023 current

Sony AI Deep Generative Model Team Research InternSony AI (Tokyo, Japan)
Investigating human-feedback-efficient RLHF algorithm for text-to-image diffusion modelfinetuning○ Algorithm can train a model for various tasks while simultaneously capturing human preference○Mar 2021 Dec 2023

Stanford Vision and Learning Lab Graduate Research AssistantStanford University (Stanford CA, USA)
Led real robot experiments in multiple human-robot collaboration projects○ Experience with a wide array of physical robots, including mobile manipulators (Sawyer, Franka,TIAGo)○ Experiences in human-in-the-loop robot learning, reinforcement learning, imitation learning,
motion planning, brain-robot-interface○Sep 2019 Dec 2019

Machine Tool Systems Research Lab Undergraduate Researcher
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Champaign IL, USA)
Investigated the effect of atomization-based cutting fluid (ACF) spray angle and distance ontool life during micro-drilling operations○ Developed a program to automatically record drill measurements from images○Sep 2018 Jun 2019

Mehta Research Group Undergraduate Researcher
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Champaign IL, USA)○Developed an adaptive particle filter algorithm for real-time identification of piano note pitch(change in pitch identified within 0.25 sec)

Work Experiences
Sep 2017 Nov 2017

Taiho Corporation of America
Electrical Engineering Intern○○

Improved inspection line program to ensure uniform operator procedure
Number of inspected parts per hour saw 20% increase

Teaching Experiences
Winter 2022 ENGR 110/210: Perspectives in Assistive Technology, Stanford University
Graduate Teaching Assistant
Fall 2021 ME 161: Dynamic Systems, Vibrations and Control, Stanford University
Graduate Teaching AssistantHonors and Awards
May 2020 Bronze Tablet Recipient, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Awarded to students who rank in the top three percent of their graduating class
Dec 2019 Graduation with Highest Honors, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

SkillsProgramming Languages: Python, C++, C#, C, Java, MATLAB, HTML/CSS
AI: Human-in-the-loop learning, shared autonomy, hierarchical learning, RL, IL, diffusion models
Hardwares: Franka, Sawyer, TIAGo
Robotics: ROS, controls, mobile manipulation, task and motion planning, camera calibration
Libraries: PyTorch, OpenCV, OMPL, NumPy
Softwares: 3D modeling (Creo, SolidWorks, Blender), Gazebo, OmniGibson, robosuite