About

Summary

Lead Developer of Voice4u at Spectrum Visions Global, Inc. Spectrum Visions' mission is to enhance learning and human expression for individuals with special needs, development delays, autism, and PDD through technology. In every engagement, we use a set of proven methodologies that guide our work and we strive to balance leading-edge technology innovation with cost-effective, reliable, secure, and adaptive IT solutions that meet or exceed our customers’ needs. Our flagship application, Voice4u, won the Grand Prize for Android Application Award 2010-11 Winter in Japan. Voice4u is used in homes, schools, and by professionals in 43 different countries. It works with iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, and Android phones. My current primarily task at Voice4u is data platform engineering as well as machine learning algorithm development. Before joining Spectrum Visions, I've worked for two space-science missions as a graduate research assistant at Stanford, LISA & ST-7, which aim to probe Albert Einstein's general relativity theory. I focused on developing a thermal control system for detecting gravitational waves with accuracy of micro-Kelvin (1 in 1,000,000 K) and received a Ph.D. in Aeronautics & Astronautics Engineering in 2009. The thermal system was designed, simulated, and operated with Python. Through the research and my doctorate dissertation, I've learned a lot of object-oriented programming as well as thermal physics, control system theories, numerical analysis (and a little bit about the theory of General Relativity). After all, I found that I just love working on software!

Specialties

- Languages: Python, Objective-C, Java, MATLAB, C, PHP, R, SQL - Data science, Heat transfer, Control system design, Precision engineering, Bootstrapping business

For more information

Voice4u: http://voice4uaac.com/ LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/higuchi

EXPERIENCE

Software Engineer/Data Scientist, Spectrum Visions Global, Inc. (July 2009 – present) Research Assistant, LISA project, Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory, Stanford University (January 2006 - March 2009) Research Assistant, ST-7 project, Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory, Stanford University (January 2004 - December 2005)

EDUCATION

Ph.D. in Aeronautics & Astronautics, STANFORD UNIVERSITY, June 2009 (Ph.D. Minor in Mechanical Engineering) Thesis: Microkelvin Thermal Control System for the LISA Mission and Beyond Master of Science in Aeronautics & Astronautics, STANFORD UNIVERSITY, December 2003 Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, WASEDA UNIVERSITY, March 2002

PUBLICATIONS

1. Sei Higuchi, Ke-Xun Sun, Daniel B. DeBra, Saps Buchman, Robert L Byer, “Design of a highly stable and uniform thermal test facility for MGRS development”, 2009 J. Phys.: Conf. Ser. 154 2. Sei Higuchi, Daniel E. Clark, Brian Lantz, Daniel B. DeBra, “Thermistor Bridge Performance in the 10-4 to 1 Hz Range And Its Applications in Gravitational Wave Detection Projects”, presented at American Society of Precision Engineering 2008 Annual Meeting, October 19-24, 2008, Portland, OR, U.S.A. 3. Sei Higuchi, Daniel B. DeBra, Steve Rock, “Sub-microkelvin Precision Thermal Control System Using Model Predictive Algorithm for Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) Ground Verification Facility”, presented at American Society of Precision Engineering 2007 Annual Meeting, October 15-20, 2007, Dallas, TX, U.S.A. 4. Sei Higuchi and Daniel B. DeBra, “High-stability Temperature Control for LISA”, presented at American Society of Precision Engineering 2006 Annual Meeting, October 15-20, 2006, Monterey, CA, U.S.A. 5. Sei Higuchi and Daniel B. DeBra, “Active Thermal Control Experiments for LISA Ground Verification Testing”, presented at 6th International LISA Symposium, June 19-23, 2006, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, ML, U.S.A. 6. Sei Higuchi, David S. Lauben, Daniel B. DeBra, et al. “High-stability temperature control for ST-7/LISA Pathfinder gravitational reference sensor ground verification testing”, Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 32:117-124, 2006 7. Ke-Xun, Sun, Nick Leindecker, Sei Higuchi, Ashot Markosyan, Roger Route, Saps Buchman, Robert L. Byer, “Development of UV LED based AC Charge Management Systems for Gravitational Wave Detectors”, presented at 7th Almadi Conference on Gravitational Waves, July 8-14, 2007. 8. A. Pettes, R. Melamud, S. Higuchi, K. Goodson, "Impact of Contact Resistances on Dimensional Scaling of Thermoelectric Energy Conversion Devices", presented at International Conference of Thermoelectrics (ICT2007), June 3-7, 2007, Jeju Island, South Korea 9. Ke-Xun Sun, Sei Higuchi, Robert L. Byer, et al, “Spectral and Power Stability Tests of Deep UV LEDs for AC Charge Management”, presented at 6th International LISA Symposium, June 19-23, 2006, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, ML, U.S.A.