# Nicole Lai-Lopez > ml researcher & eng | ml phd student @ EPFL Location: San Francisco, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/nicolelailopez Designer turned ml researcher. Scuba instructor, triathlete and nature documentarian :) with design, swe/ml experience across small, yc startups, nonprofits, and big companies such as boeing, dexcom, and sony, I currently spend most my time designing ml solutions, wrangling transformers, or exploring the outdoors (or thinking about any of these three)! I build tools to help humans and machines understand each other a little better. I also like to tell stories about the natural (notably underwater) world. My background bridges machine learning, cognitive & behavioral science, creative writing, and human-computer interaction. I'm especially keen to help advance technology-based approaches in environmental & wildlife monitoring, and to get more people involved in these efforts via some good ol storytelling. 🌊 🫂 I'm always happy to connect and explore potential collaborations (or plan the next snowboarding trip?) if the goals align! Email me at nicoleangelpty[at]gmail[dot]com 💌 Or you can subscribe to my (mostly bi-monthly) newsletter @ intensely.substack.com ## Work Experience ### Technical AI Safety Course Facilitator @ BlueDot Impact Jan 2026 – Present run weekly cohort sessions on core technical safety topics (evals, controls, interpretability, alignment) and mentor senior SWE/ML engineers & technical talent transitioning into AI safety ### Generalist @ CivAI Jan 2026 – Present | San Francisco, CA on-call generalist non-profit startup: building public understanding of AI capabilities and dangers through live demos of the technology. ### Machine Learning Engineer @ Nowadays (YC S23) Jan 2025 – Jan 2025 | San Francisco, California, United States ml: built extraction pipelines that turn contract PDFs/emails into structured quote + pricing tables swe: ship internal tooling and customer-facing features (Next.js/ts, supabase) sales/ops/admin: ran event ops + admin, represented the company on sales calls + conferences, coordinated with cvbs/hotel partners, ran user research to inform product + ops left in dec 2025 upon ml phd acceptance ### Research Assistant @ The University of British Columbia Jan 2025 – Jan 2025 | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada + NLP Research at the SLIME-Lab under Professor Jian Zhu. Topics: Speech and LLM interpretability, activation patching, TransformerLens ### Graduate Research Assistant, Computer Science @ UBC Computer Science Jan 2024 – Jan 2025 | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada + Research Assistant at the Human-AI Interaction Lab in the Computer Science Dept. at UBC under Professor Cristina Conati Topics: deep learning, eye-tracking, human-computer interaction, XAI ### Machine Learning Engineer @ Boeing Jan 2025 – Jan 2025 + Develop AI-assisted nlp pipelines + Design parsing strategies, filtering logics, and evaluation methods on aeronautical data + Support safe, scalable updates to Boeing's navigation databases ### Social Media Specialist @ NOAA: National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration Jan 2023 – Jan 2024 | San Diego, California, United States + Managed CalCOFI's Instagram account in collaboration with @noaafisherieswestcoast, strategizing and creating weekly content that resonated with diverse audiences, including public audience, scientists, and government officials. + Designed multimedia campaigns for NOAAFisheries social media accounts and internal newsletter content that generated over 150,000 monthly engagements, driving increased awareness of marine research. + Achieved a 150% follower growth on CalCOFI’s Instagram by leveraging analytics-driven strategies to boost engagement and expand audience reach. + Led the content creation lifecycle from ideation to storyboarding, scripting, filming, and production, ensuring alignment with high-regulatory standards in the public sector while fostering collaboration across interdisciplinary teams. ### UX Content Designer II @ Dexcom Jan 2022 – Jan 2024 | San Diego, California, United States + Led the development of a content design system implemented across product teams to improve alignment and voice consistency across more than half a dozen products + Established content standards by auditing and improving processes for building new copy from existing copy, reducing translation costs and accelerating production timelines. + Pioneered localization efforts by shifting from English-first copy, collaborating with translation, labeling, and design teams. + Enhanced consumer experiences in key areas such as account creation, patient onboarding, and dose recommendation across multiple products. ### Lead UX Content Designer @ Dovenmuehle Mortgage, Inc. Jan 2021 – Jan 2022 | San Francisco Bay Area + Developed and maintained clear voice and tone guidelines for client-facing and borrower-facing products + Built DMI’s content design system as sole UX writer, ensuring copy aligns with company’s values and can be scaled consistently + Advocated for customer-centered design decisions to VP, PMs, and designers by utilizing customer insights to lead the content strategy + Planned, wrote, and curated borrower-facing mortgage assistance blogposts by monitoring customer support calls and chatbot conversations to identify key customer’s pain points + Utilize JIRA and Figma as main productivity and design tools, closely collaborating with Dev team, PMs, and product designers ### Co-Founder | Co-Editor-in-Chief @ Other People Jan 2019 – Jan 2021 | San Diego, California, United States + Co-founded first student-run UCSD magazine for artists to share work + Effectively designed an editorial workflow that produced weekly newsletters, short stories, and reviewed third-party submissions + Managed a 30+ student team publish 2 issues + Oversaw magazine production, team recruitment, event coordination & social media content creation + Developed the magazine’s brand, tone, and style, and curated further content to adhere with the magazine’s identity ### Lead Product Designer @ UCSD Design Lab Jan 2020 – Jan 2021 UX/UI Designer, Content Editor, and UX Writer for the Diabetes Design Initiative + Redesigned the company's website UI using Webflow + Reviewed and edited website’s written content to increase readability and engagement + Attended company’s meetings and student projects to cover stories and case studies for website content ### Conversation Designer @ Traits AI Jan 2020 – Jan 2021 | San Diego, California, United States Researcher and Conversational Designer for an AI company + Exploring ways AI can augment the end-of-life care experience for both patients and healthcare providers + Working remotely with three teammates and mentorship from Designers, Healthcare Providers, and Developers to design a conversational agent for Patients + Collaborative project with UC San Diego ### Design Project Manager @ Dexcom Jan 2021 – Jan 2021 | San Diego, California, United States + Work alongside Dexcom and Design Lab mentors to complete a 10-week design project + Perform user interviews and research on Diabetes + Function as point-of-contact between industry and students + Sponsored by UCSD's Design Lab ### Product Design Intern @ Sony Jan 2020 – Jan 2021 | San Diego, California, United States + Explored different ways people can stay connected during the pandemic using VR + Analyzed the current onboarding experience for new hires joining the workforce remotely + Performed user interviews across large pools of new hires from AT&T, Linkedin, and Sony + Collaborated with Sony mentors to design a lo-fi prototype using VR ### Sensorimotor Intern @ Cortica Jan 2019 – Jan 2020 | La Jolla, California + Design and implement personalized sensory experiences to enhance children interaction and integration, focusing on tailored needs and feedback. + Conduct patient observations and record insights to optimize educational engagement and functional outcomes for children with autism. + Continuously evaluate and iterate on intervention strategies based on children feedback and performance metrics to ensure optimal outcomes. + Collaborate with occupational therapists to formulate new goals by analyzing children data and identifying key insights for improved therapy outcomes. ### Writing Tutor @ University of California San Diego Jan 2020 – Jan 2020 | Greater San Diego Area ### Resident Advisor @ UC San Diego - Housing • Dining • Hospitality Jan 2018 – Jan 2020 | Greater San Diego Area ### Barista @ UC San Diego - Housing • Dining • Hospitality Jan 2017 – Jan 2019 | University of California, San Diego + Y'all know what this one's like ### Research Intern @ Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute Jan 2016 – Jan 2017 | Panama ## Education ### Master of Science in Data Science & Natural Language Processing The University of British Columbia ### Bachelor of Science in Cognitive & Behavioural Neuroscience - Literature & Design Double Minor UC San Diego ### Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/nicolailo - Website: https://nicolelailo.com --- Source: https://flows.cv/nicolelailopez JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/nicolelailopez/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-08