About

I'm Jiaqi Sun, an Electronic Engineering major at Southern University of Science and Technology, graduating in 2026. I spent a semester on exchange at Stony Brook University and am currently a visiting researcher at North Carolina State University.

My interests keep landing at the boundary between hardware and algorithms — how drones learn to fly together indoors without GPS, how a wearable stays accurate while its wearer is running, how drone photographs of a paddy field become a trustworthy measure of crop health. Those three look unrelated, but they are the same problem: the real world is messy, and the job is making systems that stay reliable inside that mess.

That interest started early. As a kid I pulled apart stereos and radios — work out how the thing is wired, then put it back together and get it playing. That is where I first understood that hardware and software have to accommodate each other before anything works at all. Embedded design, timing constraints, wireless protocols: still the same lesson, just further along.

What I want to build

I want to build sensing systems that still work under real constraints.

Three of them in particular: the signal falls apart the moment the body moves, wireless links add latency, and multiple channels have to stay strictly aligned. None of these are problems on a lab bench. All of them are problems the moment the device is on a person and out of the room — I ran into each one on the PPG project.

Rather than push a model's numbers a little higher, I would rather build the kind of thing that can actually leave the lab: embedded systems, wearable sensing, and the sort of design that only holds together when hardware and software are worked out as one.

Beyond engineering

I shoot photographs, dive, and skydive. These are not decoration on a CV — they share something with the research: both demand judgment under uncertainty, and both punish inattention to detail.

  • A-License HolderUnited States Parachute Association
  • Advanced Open Water DiverProfessional Association of Diving Instructors
  • 2 Star FreediverInternational Association for the Development of Apnea
  • DELF B1 (French)France Éducation international
  • Tennis Skill Grade — ElementarySUSTech Sports Center

More photos live on the Sports page.

Quick facts

Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech)
B.Eng. in Electronic Engineering
Currently
Visiting researcher at North Carolina State University, multi-drone swarms
Graduating
2026
Programming
Java, Python, C, VHDL, MATLAB
Tools
Fusion, IntelliJ IDEA, Arduino IDE, VS Code
Languages
Chinese (native), English, French (intermediate)
Interests
Photography, Scuba Diving, Skydiving, Saxophone, Tennis

Involved in

  • SUSTech Fishing ClubSep. 2025 – Present
  • SUSTech Dive TeamSep. 2022 – Present
  • Stony Brook University Running ClubJan. 2025 – Aug. 2025
  • SUSTech New Media AssociationJun. 2022 – Aug. 2023

Get in touch