Daniel Bonkowsky

Education

University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA
Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering
June 2027 (Expected)
  • GPA: 4.0/4.0
  • IEEE - Eta Kappa Nu Honor Society Member
  • Coursework: Computer Organization and Systems Programming, Advanced Data Structures, Algorithm Design, Analog Circuit Design, Signal Processing, Components and Circuits Laboratory
West High School
June 2023
  • GPA: 4.64/4.0
  • International Baccalaureate Diploma Program Graduate
  • National Merit Scholar
  • 35 ACT

Experience

SEELab, La Jolla, CA
Undergraduate Researcher
April 2025 - Present
  • Working to improve energy-efficiency and inference accuracy of machine learning models for bird call identification
  • Applications range from urban wildlife tracking to low-powered rural ecology
  • Advisor: Professor Tajana Rosing
RoboCup SSL Team, La Jolla, CA
Embedded Systems Team Lead
Oct 2024 - Present
  • Overhauled embedded infrastructure bridging software and drivetrain from Python to C++ on ESP32 for ∼88% power efficiency improvement
  • Streamlined UDP data pipeline composed of Protobuf parsing, robot-to-wheel vector conversions, and transmission of UART/CAN commands, PWM and GPIO signals to BLDC motors and solenoid kicker
  • Implemented GUI to quicktune PID parameters on STM32
  • Organized and led team meetings and presented biweekly at team lead conference
Competitive Programming Team, La Jolla, CA
Team Member and Competitor
Sept 2023 - Present
  • Compete at yearly International Collegiate Programming Contest against competitors from around the U.S. to solve algorithmic and mathematical programming problems
  • Top 15 competitor at UCSD (two years qualified in a row)
bioMérieux, Salt Lake City, UT
Bioinformatics Intern
June 2024 - Sept 2024
  • Developed, ran, and analyzed data from two experiments which confirmed theories regarding PCR efficacy
  • Analyzed legacy genomic data to develop new interpretations of outliers and found correlations in previously unexplained data
  • Presented findings effectively to facilitate understanding between team members both locally and in France
CS ForEach, La Jolla, CA
Volunteer
Sept 2023 - Mar 2024
  • Taught engineering lessons at five different underserved K-12 schools in the San Diego area in topics such as Introduction to Programming, Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning
  • Developed online software demos which promoted hands-on student learning
  • Collaborated with a team to create educational computer science content for students

Projects

Semantic Search Engine
April 2025
  • Created a search engine to query e-commerce databases using semantic meaning rather than keywords resulting in noticeable improvements (e.g. "not red shirt" returned shirts that weren’t red)
  • Used OpenAI’s vector embeddings model to extract meanings from products and queries and MongoDB to store large e-commerce database
  • Won best e-commerce product and best use of MongoDB at DiamondHacks hackathon
Text to Tracks: A Subway Surfers Video Article Converter
April 2024
  • Worked with a team to create a web application which scrapes online articles and converts them to captioned videos for easier digestion of information
  • Developed article-to-speech pipeline and caption timing system
  • Awarded an Honorable Mention at the DiamondHacks hackathon
IB Computer Science Tabletop Role Playing Game Simulator
Sept 2022 - Feb 2023
  • Developed an application for a client which allowed them to model Dungeons & Dragons combat and create better campaigns for their players
  • Oversaw communication with the client to design an appropriate software solution for their problem and ahered to a project timeline for completion

Skills

Software: C, C++, Python, Java, Unix, Linux, Git, LaTeX, MATLAB, R
Hardware: Raspberry Pi, ESP32, STM32, Microprocessors
Interpersonal: Teamwork, Leadership, Project Management, Presenting, Public Speaking, Education, Teaching