I'm a Software Engineer with interest in UX Research and Software Architecture. I use data to understand user needs and optimize product decisions throughout the entire feature lifecycle.
I'm a software engineer and CS student at Pitt with the goal to become a product engineer. I began my studies focused on algorithms and data structures, but my perspective on software engineering has evolved since I started. I used to only focus on making code work, but now I'm constantly thinking about whether we're building the right thing. Will people use this? Does it solve a real problem? Does it create real value?
The shift started when I got into a research lab in 2024 and learned about UX for the first time. Suddenly I was collecting data on how people actually behave with software, not just how we think they should. That was my first taste of data-driven development. After a year, I stepped up to lead a dev team building an app from scratch at the Lab, then worked at EDA Clinical as a Software Engineer on clinical data workflows. These experiences have defined my mentality as someone who cares about the code being solid as much as building something that actually drives user and business value.
In 2025, I co-founded and became vice president of the User Experience Organization at Pitt, where we're building a community for students interested in UX design and research. Outside of coding, I love getting creative through theater. I performed in Our Town with the Performance Collaborative last fall and actually met my partner in a theatre class.
At the STIW Research Lab, I serve as a Software Engineer, leading the architecture and technical decisions across six projects. My most significant project was leading a team of 4 developers to create an AI canvas-based research application designed to support reintegration services for formerly incarcerated individuals. I drove the technical architecture, which featured a React.js and Firestore front end for real-time data collection and user engagement tracking. The application also included AI image detection capabilities powered by a Python backend and deployed on a Flask server. After successfully deploying the tool across 3 organizations, we conducted 4 user study workshops to evaluate its effectiveness, with findings expected to be published by November 2025. At my time at the lab I've worked on 6 projects. I've built an Re-entry Support application that served over 30 users, re-architected a Firestore database to improve query performance by 9x, and optimized a video recommendation system with lazy loading, reducing initial load times from 12s to 4s.
As a Software Engineer and UX Designer at EDA Clinical, I focused on both the technical implementation and user experience of our core applications. I developed the frontend of our event-driven task tracking and JSON visualization platform, a tool designed to streamline FDA submission workflows. This application was built using Next.js and React Query on a solid foundation of Azure services, which included a security architecture that I implemented using Azure Entra ID, JWT/OAuth2, and RBAC. My contributions extended to critical performance and data-handling features. For instance, I optimized a SAS to JSON dataset viewer using lazy loading from Cloud Storage, reducing initial load times by 90%. I also engineered a real-time data stream using React Query to provide medical researchers with instant updates for ongoing studies. All of my development work was informed by user requirements through discussions with data reviewers to ensure the final product met their exact needs and validated use cases.
Developed responsive frontend pages and components for Sharp Education's website using React.js and Storybook for component documentation. In addition, I participated in the Big Idea Blitz Competition with Sharp Education, creating a pitch slide deck to showcase Sharp Education's product vision.
Designed a Figma prototype for Forevergreen's mobile carbon calculator with user flows for carbon footprint input, calculation, progress visualization, and offset opportunities.
Vice President & Founding Member
Co-founded first-of-its-kind UX organization at University of Pittsburgh. Grew membership to 145+ students and organized weekly events on industry topics including case study writing and UX research fundamentals.
HCI/UX Branch Leader & Mentor
Managed UX branch providing career guidance to 50+ students. Organized guest speaker series with industry UX professionals sharing insights on design careers and best practices.
Haptics Project & Battlebots Team Member
Designed and fabricated Battle Bot using Autodesk Fusion 360. Competed in National BattleBots Competition and developed Python-based haptic feedback system for visually impaired users.
A tool for exploring CDISC data tables in JSON format, eliminating the need for SAS. Built at EDA Clinical to streamline clinical data review processes with an intuitive interface for navigating complex datasets.
Led development of an AI-powered canvas application supporting reintegration services for formerly incarcerated individuals. Features real-time data collection, user engagement tracking, and AI image detection capabilities.
App to collect data and perform linear regression to predict optimal egg cooking time
Created a simulated stock trading market with 2 classmates an API for real-time market data of 50+ stock symbols
For 2024 XProject developed an AI that simulates 4 brain neurons and electrical synapses to make a robodog walk
A database to store and manage Olympic athlete information with functions to query times and update athlete records
A suit of different test cases developed for a variety of Java applications
A C implementation of the semaphore concept for process synchronization and multithreading
An implementation of a text auto-completer using a trie data structure in Java
A network analysis tools (2 verticies fail, average latency) with vertices representing switches and edges representing cable types
I contribute to the research and software development community through publications, conference presentations, and technical writing. My focus centers on design thinking and problem-solving and building technology that creates real value for users.
PHUSE SDE Boston 2025
James Joseph, Xiang Hao, Florian Reihl
A comprehensive look at implementing Event-Driven Architecture for Quality Control of Analysis Data Model (ADaM) datasets. This presentation explores how modern software architecture patterns can solve traceability challenges in clinical data programming and establish trust through automated audit trails.
Undergraduate Research Conference Pennsylvania (URC-PA)
Florian Reihl, Mofe Taiwo
Research exploring digital literacy challenges faced by formerly incarcerated individuals during reintegration. Through interviews and user behavior analysis, we identified technological needs and design principles to support successful community reentry in an increasingly digital world.
I'm currently running a user study in STIW Labs on returning members of society and how to help them achieve their goals. I plan on publishing by the end of the year.
I'm always excited to discuss new opportunities how I can help you, future innovative projects, or just chat about the latest in tech. I'd love to hear about what you're working on.
