Yanna Lin

Postdoc at UWaterloo

yanna.lin@uwaterloo.ca
Github

Education

2020–2024 Ph.D. in Computer Science & Engineering, Hong Kong University of Science and Techonology Hong Kong, China

Advised by Prof. Huamin Qu
Member of the VisLab

2015–2019 B.S. in Software Engineering, Sun Yat-sen University Guangdong, China

GPA: 4.4/5.0, highest distinction, rank 1/447
Member of Yixian Lion team

Notable Awards

2023 HKUST RedBird Academic Excellence Award

An award in recognition of the outstanding performance and research capacity of the students

2022 HKUST RedBird Academic Excellence Award

An award in recognition of the outstanding performance and research capacity of the students

2021 IEEE VIS Honorable Mention Award

For “VBridge: Connecting the Dots Between Features and Data to Explain Healthcare Model”

2021 ChinaVis Best Paper Nomination

For “Modeling layout design for multiple-view visualization via Bayesian inference”

2020–2024 Hong Kong PhD Fellowship Scheme

Highly competitive scholarship for the best and brightest students in the world to pursue their PhD studies in Hong Kong’s universities

2016–2018 (3 consecutive years) National scholarship and First-class scholarship

For top 2% students

2018 Third prize in the south race area

For the 17th National College Student robot contest

2018 Meritorious Winner

For 2018 American Mathematical Contest In Modeling

2018 Second-class Prize in Guangdong

For Contemporary Undergraduate Mathematical Contest In Modeling

2017 Second-class Prize in Guangdong

For the 14th Challenge Cup, the extracurricular academic and technological works competition for Guangdong college students

2017 Honorable Mention

For 2017 American Mathematical Contest In Modeling

Publications

Conference

C14

Open-ended Structured Question Assessment with Human-LLM Collaboration

Fengyan Lin, Yanna Lin, Kai Cao, Zikun Deng, Yi Cai. CHI, 2026.

C13

Capability at a Glance: Design Guidelines for Intuitive Avatars Communicating Augmented Actions in Virtual Reality

Yang Lu, Tianyu Zhang, Jiamu Tang, Yanna Lin, Jiankun Yang, Longyu Zhang, Shijian Luo, Yukang Yan. CHI, 2026.

C12

DiLLS: Interactive Diagnosis of LLM-based Multi-agent Systems via Layered Summary of Agent Behaviors

Rui Sheng, Yukun Yang, Chuhan Shi, Yanna Lin, Zixin Chen, Huamin Qu, Furui Cheng. CHI, 2026.

C11

RhythmTA: A Visual-aided Interactive System for ESL Rhythm Training via Dubbing Practice

Chang Chen, Sicheng Song, Shuchang Xu, Zhicheng Li, Huamin Qu, Yanna Lin*. UIST, 2025.

PDF Video Slides

C10

Unmasking Deceptive Visuals: Benchmarking Multimodal Large Language Models on Misleading Chart Question Answering

Zixin Chen, Sicheng Song, Kashun Shum, Yanna Lin, Rui Sheng, Huamin Qu. EMNLP (Selected as Oral), 2025.

PDF

InterLink: Linking Text with Code and Output in Computational Notebooks

Yanna Lin, Leni Yang, Haotian Li, Huamin Qu, Dominik Moritz. CHI, 2025.

PDF Video Slides Supplementary

DataWink: Reusing and Adapting SVG-based Visualization Examples with Large Multimodal Models

Liwenhan Xie, Yanna Lin, Can Liu, Huamin Qu, Xinhuan Shu. IEEE VIS2025/TVCG, 2025.

PDF Project Video

Designing Spatial Visualization and Interactions of Immersive Sankey Diagram in Virtual Reality

Yang Lu, Junxian Li, Zhitong Cui, Jiapeng Hu, Yanna Lin, Shijian Luo. MM (Selected as Oral, 4%), 2024.

PDF Video

OutlineSpark: Igniting AI-powered Presentation Slides Creation from Computational Notebooks through Outlines

Fengjie Wang, Yanna Lin, Haotian Li, Leni Yang, Huamin Qu, Min Zhu. CHI, 2024.

PDF Video

VENUS: A Geometrical Representation for Quantum State Visualization

Shaolun Ruan, Ribo Yuan, Qiang Guan, Yanna Lin, Ying Mao, Weiwen Jiang, Zhepeng Wang, Wei Xu, Yong Wang. EuroVis, 2023.

PDF Project

InkSight: Leveraging Sketch Interaction for Documenting Chart Findings in Computational Notebooks

Yanna Lin, Haotian Li, Leni Yang, Aoyu Wu, Huamin Qu. IEEE VIS2023/TVCG, 2023.

PDF Video Slides Supplementary

VBridge: Connecting the Dots Between Features and Data to Explain Healthcare Models

Furui Cheng, Dongyu Liu, Fan Du, Yanna Lin, Alexandra Zytek, Haomin Li, Huamin Qu, Kalyan Veeramachaneni. TVCG, 2021.

PDF Project Video Bibtex

Best Paper Honorable Mention Award

Modeling layout design for multiple-view visualization via Bayesian inference

Lingdan Shao, Zhe Chu, Xi Chen, Yanna Lin, Wei Zeng. ChinaVis, 2021.

PDF Project

Best Paper Honorable Mention Award

Composition and Configuration Patterns in Multiple-View Visualizations

Xi Chen, Wei Zeng, Yanna Lin, Hayder Mahdi Al-maneea, Jonathan Roberts, Remco Chang. TVCG, 2020.

PDF Project Bibtex

Poster

Let Every Seat Be Perfect! A Case Study on Combining BIM and VR for Room Planning

Wai Tong*, Haotian Li*, Huan Wei*, Liwenhan Xie*, Yanna Lin*, Huamin Qu. *:equal contribution Proceedings of the 2022 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (VR), 2022.

PDF Video Slides

Journal

GVVST: Image-Driven Style Extraction from Graph Visualizations for Visual Style Transfer

Sicheng Song, Yipeng Zhang, Yanna Lin, Huamin Qu, Changbo Wang, Chenhui Li. TVCG, 2024.

PDF

VIOLET: Visual Analytics for Explainable Quantum Neural Networks

Shaolun Ruan, Zhiding Liang, Qiang Guan, Paul Griffin, Xiaolin Wen, Yanna Lin, Yong Wang. PacificVis'24/TVCG, 2024.

PDF

DMiner: Dashboard Design Mining and Recommendation

Yanna Lin, Haotian Li, Aoyu Wu, Yong Wang, Huamin Qu. TVCG (Early Access), 2023.

PDF Slides Supplementary

Saliency-aware color harmony models for outdoor signboard

Yanna Lin, Wei Zeng, Yu Ye, Huamin Qu. Computers & Graphics, 2022.

PDF Video Supplementary

Teaching

2021 Spring COMP 4631: Computer and Communication Security HKUST

Teaching Assistant for Prof. Cunsheng Ding

2021 Fall COMP 4631: Computer and Communication Security HKUST

Teaching Assistant for Prof. Cunsheng Ding

2018 Fall Principle of Computer Network SYSU

Teaching Assistant for Prof. Haibo Tian

2017 Fall Circuits and Electronics SYSU

Teaching Assistant for Prof. Chaodong He