Hi, I’m Hongzhao Guan, and if the pronunciation is tricky for you, you can think of it like three English words: Home-Jaw Guam. I’m a Triple Jacket. I earned both my master’s and PhD degrees under the guidance of our institute director, Pascal Van Hentenryck. After completing my PhD, I transitioned into my current role as a research engineer with AI4OPT.

A Natural Path to AI4OPT

I first got into operations research and machine learning during my undergrad at Georgia Tech in ISyE. I became involved with AI4OPT somewhat naturally because my advisor, Pascal Van Hentenryck, actually founded the institute when I was doing my PhD. So, when AI4OPT was launched, I was automatically part of the team from the start, and I’ve been involved ever since. Very excited the team is growing each day.

Research, Mentorship, and Real-World Impact

I am involved in several research projects as a research engineer in the domains of transportation, supply chain, and computational social science. I also advise students, which has been a really rewarding part of the role. Moreover, I am part of a software development team where we build tools to support on-demand multimodal transit systems, helping bridge the gap between research and real-world applications. We recently had a very successful collaboration with the transit agency CAT in Savannah.

Life Outside of Research

Outside of work, I really enjoy reading and playing music. I’m also a big soccer fan.

Words to Live By

One quote that really resonates with me is from Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace:
“The two most powerful warriors are patience and time.”
The more I move forward in life and in my career, the more I see how true that is. Even just finishing War and Peace itself took a good dose of both. It’s one of my favorite books. :)