Zhuoran (Elara) Liu

I am Elara Liu, a first-year Ph.D. student in the Computer Science and Informatics program at Emory University, working with Azra Ismail. I previously earned an M.S. in Computer Science from Northwestern University, where I was advised by Haoqi Zhang and Karan Ahuja. Before that, I earned a B.S. with a double major in Computer Science and Informatics from UC Irvine. I build end-to-end interactive systems spanning interface design, data pipelines, and empirical evaluation, with an emphasis on human needs, user context, and real-world constraints.

My research interests lie at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Health Informatics, and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). I am interested in how interactive and intelligent systems can better support people in everyday health contexts, particularly when information is incomplete or distributed across different people and sources. My current work explores human-centered AI, patient-clinician communication and collaboration, and ways to make health technologies easier to understand and use for people with diverse needs.