Award Recognizes Significance and Impact of Research

Each semester, the Dan E. Wells Outstanding Dissertation Award is presented to a doctoral student in the University of Houston College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics who has conducted exceptional research and submitted the college’s most outstanding dissertation. The Spring 2025 recipient was Vuong Dustin Nguyen, a Ph.D. graduate in computer science.

The award was announced during the NSM Commencement ceremony on May 9. Nguyen received a certificate and a $1,000 prize in recognition of his achievement.

Nguyen’s dissertation, titled “Towards Robust Person Re-Identification: Learning Invariant Features Under Clothing Changes and Occlusions,” addresses a major challenge in modern surveillance and forensic applications: consistently identifying individuals in visual data when appearances change or when people are partially obscured.

His research, under the mentorship of Shishir Shah, professor in the Department of Computer Science, developed generative machine learning models capable of detecting invariant characteristics by analyzing both physical features and individual mannerisms. The models improve the ability to match individuals in video footage despite variables such as altered clothing or visual obstructions.

Following graduation, Nguyen will begin work as an AI research scientist at Autodesk, Inc., where he will contribute to advancements in generative artificial intelligence for 3D and computer-aided design (CAD) models within the Autodesk AI Lab.

- Kristoffer Smith, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics