Interview with Dr. Tianlong Chen—Winner of the Electronics Young Investigator Award

The journal Electronics (ISSN: 2304-8158) is delighted to present the winner of the 2025 Young Investigator Award—Dr. Tianlong Chen.

Dr. Tianlong Chen is the recipient of the 2025 Electronics Young Investigator Award. He is an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Chief AI Scientist at hireEZ. He received his PhD degree in ECE from UT Austin in 2023 and completed a postdoctoral appointment at MIT and Harvard in 2024. His research focuses on efficient and reliable machine learning, large language model agents, multimodal learning, and AI for bioscience. He has received the Meta Research Award, Amazon Research Award, Cisco Faculty Award, and several best/outstanding paper awards from various conferences and workshops.

1. Could you please briefly introduce yourself, including your current affiliation and main research areas?
I received my PhD degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 2023. After that, I was a postdoctoral researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (CSAIL@MIT), Harvard University (BMI@Harvard), and the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard in 2023-2024. I joined the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science in Fall 2024. My research focuses on building accurate, trustworthy, and efficient machine learning systems.

2. What motivated you to pursue a career in academia?
In industry, the research done was usually in the service of commercial benefits. On the contrary, in academia, I can have the agency to align my professional output with my personal research interests. Having full control over my research agenda ensures that I can remain dedicated to solving the complex problems I am most passionate about, rather than being limited by the shifting priorities to serve the industry’s demand. That’s why I chose to become an independent principal investigator.

3. What major challenges have you encountered when transitioning from a student to a faculty member?
As a PhD student or a postdoc, we mainly focus on finishing our own project or the tasks assigned by our advisor. However, as a professor, I have more responsibilities than just managing my own business. There are three main challenges I have encountered. The first one is funding. I have to apply for fundings and grants to support my entire research group. The second one is teaching duty. As a professor, I need to educate the next generation of students in our university and prepare them for future challenges. The third one is also related to cultivating the next generation of scientists. I have to manage all my research group members and make research plans for them, giving them guidance. Overall, as a professor, I need to take care of many other responsibilities, especially education.

4. You mentioned the process of applying for research funding earlier. Given the current landscape, how challenging are you finding the pursuit of grants as an early career independent researcher?
I agree that it is harder than usual to apply for sufficient funding this year, given the significant cut in research funding overall. However, it is not impossible. As long as the research proposal is well-prepared, there are still opportunities for us to receive funding.

5. What advice would you give to early career researchers or young scientists who are just starting their academic journey?
From my experience, being a scientist requires a high degree of resilience and the ability to endure solitude. Much of the research process involves hyper focus and a “lonely” period of hard work before achieving results. While reaching milestones—such as having a paper accepted or receiving peer recognition—provides positive feedback loops, these rewards often take a long time to materialize.
Ultimately, we need immense determination, a tolerance for isolation, and consistent effort to be successful in an academic career.

6. In your view, what are the most promising directions in your research that you are excited about?
Our research is organized into three primary directions: efficient deployment for edge electronics, multimodal learning, and AI for Science. The first one is the most related to the scope of the journal Electronics. While the latter two fields are currently trending topics often dominated by large-scale corporate interests, our mission deviates from purely commercial goals. Rather than seeking commercial gain, we focus on human-centric AI applications. We prioritize AI applications with a broader societal impact, particularly within the biomedical sector, to enhance the quality of daily life for the general public.

7. Do you have any suggestions or advice for our journal?
Electronics serves as an excellent platform for researchers in this field, offering a comprehensive scope that encompasses the most pressing topics of interest to the scientific community. To further its success, I believe the journal should focus on strategic promotion to increase its impact and popularity within the research community.