Curriculum Vitae

Education

Ph.D., Computer Science
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, August 2021
GPA: 5.0/5.0

S.M., Computer Science
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, June 2018
GPA: 5.0/5.0

B.S., Computer Engineering, Summa Cum Laude
Boston University, May 2016
GPA: 4.0/4.0

Research

PhD work focused on the intersection between high-performance computing, computational genomics, and compilers, specifically by developing a domain-specific language for writing genomics applications. Prior master's work focused primarily on third-generation sequencing data, and applications like sequence alignment, genotyping, and haplotype phasing.

Skills

• Extensive programming experience with C, C++, Python and Java. Proficient with Scala and Matlab.
• Worked extensively on POSIX systems, incl. several GNU/Linux distributions and macOS.
• Experienced with a range of bioinformatics software, pipelines and formats, especially those pertaining to sequencing.
• Worked extensively with the LLVM compiler infrastructure; moderately with Android, Amazon AWS, MongoDB, Kali Linux, and embedded systems development.

Experience

Software Engineering Intern (Summer 2019)

Google / YouTube, Mountain View, CA

• Worked on enabling internal database system to run large distributed analytics queries on very big (order of petabytes) datasets.
• Project involved database theory and distributed systems.
• Predominantly used C++ along with several Google-internal technologies and systems.

Research Intern (2013—2016)

Berger Lab, MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory

• Worked in Prof. Bonnie Berger's group in MIT CSAIL in computational biology, developing improved algorithms for genotyping/variant calling.
• Work predominantly entailed C and Python programming on Linux systems.
• http://lava.csail.mit.edu

Intern (Summer 2013)

Charles River Analytics, Cambridge, MA

• Focused on developing a Scala-embedded domain-specific language for probabilistic programming.
• https://cra.com/work/case-studies/figaro

Research Intern (2012—2013)

Harvard University, Department of Mathematics

• Interned for Fields medalist Prof. Shing-Tung Yau in Harvard University's Mathematics Department. Primarily focused on a subset of algebraic topology relevant to graph theory. Work pertained to computationally determining certain properties of random directed graphs. A range of programming languages was used, from Java to Python to Matlab.
• Led to Bronze Award in Yau High School Mathematics Awards in Beijing, China.
• https://github.com/arshajii/digraph-homology

Teaching

Teaching Assistant and Grader (Spring 2015)

Applied Algorithms and Data Structures for Engineers

• Led a weekly discussion session of about 80 students. Sessions primarily consisted of lecturing on topics covered in class, with occasional quizzes.
• Graded assignments.
• http://www.bu.edu/academics/eng/courses/eng-ec-330

Teaching Assistant and Grader (Spring 2015)

Introduction to Software Engineering

• Assisted in a weekly lab session of about 30 students. Sessions primarily consisted of students implementing concepts taught in class.
• Graded assignments and exams.
• http://www.bu.edu/academics/eng/courses/eng-ec-327

Publications

• Shajii and Numanagić et al. A Python-based programming language for high-performance computational genomics. Nature Biotechnology 2021
• Shajii and Numanagić et al. Seq: a high-performance language for bioinformatics. OOPSLA 2019
• Shajii et al. Statistical Binning for Barcoded Reads Improves Downstream Analyses. Cell Systems 2018 Awarded Best Student Paper at RECOMB 2018
• Shajii et al. Fast genotyping of known SNPs through approximate k-mer matching. Bioinformatics 2016

Miscellaneous

• Active on programming Q&A site Stack Overflow; current reputation score of >100k, ranked #651 among all users (top 0.15% all time).
• Co-developed Orbit, an $n$-body simulator for Android, featured in Popular Science magazine.
• Member of Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society.