“When I was a kid, I was good at math, but I didn’t enjoy pure math, which is often limited to paper and pencil. I am more drawn to applying mathematics to solve real-world problems,” said associate professor Yifei Lou, who holds a joint position in the UNC School of Data Science and Society (SDSS) and the department of mathematics in the UNC College of Arts and Sciences.
After graduating from Peking University in China, Lou continued her graduate studies in applied mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles. During her time there, she studied abroad in Paris, France. According to Lou, this experience motivated her to forge international connections, including through research and study abroad, such as Carolina’s long-time global partnership with National University of Singapore (NUS).
Using mathematics to address complex challenges
Lou’s research focuses on the mathematics of imaging processing. She develops algorithms, analyzes their properties, and then applies them to solve problems.
For example, while at Carolina, she has been working on hyperspectral imaging analysis with Jocelyn Chanussot, a professor at the Grenoble Institute of Technology in France. Their work addresses a common challenge in hyperspectral imaging, which helps people find objects or detect materials in industries like health care, agriculture and defense. Although the technology captures extremely detailed color information, the images themselves are often low-resolution, and a single pixel can contain a blend of different materials. Lou focuses on “unmixing” these pixels so researchers can identify what materials are present and in what amounts, even when the image isn’t sharp.
In recent experiments, the method Lou helped develop improved existing unmixing techniques by more than 50 percent, and it required less than one percent of the original training data — a result that could make this type of analysis faster, more accurate and more widely usable.
Expanding research through global partnerships
Based on her research interests and passion for global collaboration, many of Lou’s colleagues at SDSS recommended she apply for a Global Partnership Award with UNC Global Affairs. Global Partnership Awards are offered in two categories: exploration grants, which fund UNC-Chapel Hill faculty members to explore connections with researchers around the world, and expansion grants, which build on existing collaborations. Many faculty apply for an exploration grant and then, in subsequent years, apply for an expansion grant.
In spring 2025, Lou received an exploration grant to meet with her collaborator at NUS. This first step led her to apply for an expansion grant, which was awarded in fall 2025, to facilitate two global exchange workshops between Carolina and NUS. The first, called “The Workshop on Learning Computational Science,” will take place in March 2026 in Singapore. Lou is organizing the conference with Hui Ji, professor in the NUS Department of Mathematics, and Youzuo Lin, associate professor in SDSS.
The workshop will bring together faculty and researchers from several disciplines at Carolina, NUS and Duke University — as well as from Texas, Germany and the United Kingdom — to discuss their research on modern machine learning, computational mathematics and domain-specific modeling to address challenges across industries and disciplines. In 2027, UNC-Chapel Hill will host a second workshop for the researchers in Chapel Hill with support from Duke.
“I’ve gotten to know Yifei, and I like her commitment to and her appreciation for the potential that working with global partners can bring to help solve a global challenge,” said Krista Northup, director for global partnerships in UNC Global Affairs.
“The support from UNC Global Affairs has been critical to launching and expanding these efforts,” said SDSS’s Interim Senior Director of the Office for Research and Director of the Office of Cross-Sector Partnerships Joyce Tan. “The SDSS Office of Research is proud to support these initiatives and partner with Drs. Lou and Lin as part of its mission to strengthen cross-sector and international research collaborations.”
By Jordan Andreasen, UNC Global Affairs