Tianhua Jing

Tianhua Jing holds a B.Eng. in Industrial Design and Engineering from Northeastern University and an M.A. in Design from Hunan University. 
 
Tianhua is an award-winning designer with accolades in international product, media and communication design competitions. He also holds a personal utility model patent for kids bike design. 
 
Tianhua was a member of the design team for Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Athlete Apartment Smart Bed Design, where he focused on visual concepts. Tianhua gained professional experience as an industrial design intern at Mindray, China‘s largest medical device company. Prior to that, he collaborated on design and research projects with industry leaders including Huawei, SANY Group, China Academy of Machinery Science and Technology. 
 
As a researcher, Tianhua Jing focuses on digital avatar and metaverse technologies. His latest publication at CHCHI 2022 employed a mixed-methods approach to investigate how users in NFT communities perceive their avatars as extensions of identities and how rarity attributes shape their aesthetic experiences. 

Tianhua Jing is currently working on an ongoing research project titled "Designing Avatar-Inhabited Educational Metaverse with Rural School Children", under the supervision of Andrew Selby and Steve Summerskill.  
 
The project centers on the interaction between humans and avatars in digital educational environments. By employing a tailored participatory design approach, the researcher collaborates with rural school children in China to integrate accessible metaverse technologies and large language model AI into primary school education. 
 
Tianhua’s research interests span digital avatars, educational metaverse, AI-assisted design and contemporary Chinese digital culture.