Hi, I'm Arun Krishna Vajjala

Computer Science Researcher
Research Scientist
Applied Researcher

Hi, I am Arun!

I am a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science at George Mason University (GMU), specializing in applying machine learning, particularly Large Language Models (LLMs), to enhance software engineering workflows. My research focuses on developing tools that improve developer productivity, UI comprehension, and accessibility.
My research is conducted under the guidance of Dr. Kevin Moran in the SAGE Lab. One of my key projects involves exploring in-context program repair using LLMs, automating code fixes with minimal developer intervention. I’m also working on task-based generation and fine-tuning techniques with diffusion models to optimize LLMs for specific tasks. I also gained valuable industry experience as a research intern at Microsoft, where I developed LLM-powered solutions to automate and optimize developer workflows, significantly improving productivity.

Seeking full-time opportunities as a Research Scientist, Applied Scientist, or Researcher!

My Resume

Latest News


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June - August 2024

Microsoft Research Internship

April 2024

Submitted FRAME to an A* SE Conference

August 2023

Published MOTOREASE at ICSE 2024

August 2023

Published MOTOREASE at ICSE 2024

May 2022

Started work on a systemic literature review

January 2022

Started my PhD at GMU

December 2021

Completed my Master's Degree at GMU

June 2021

Worked as a research and design intern at Alcon

January 2021

Started my Master's Degree at GMU

December 2020

Completed my Bachelor's Degree at GMU

June 2020

Worked as a software engineering intern at ISSI

Bachelor's

Fall 2020

Master's

Fall 2021

PhD (Expected)

Spring 2025

Publications

A. Krishna Vajjala, Aj. Krishna Vajjala, Y. Yan, S. Pothagoni, D. Poshyvanyk, and K. Moran. "FRAME: Enhancing Multimodal GUI Embeddings with Structural Information". (In Review)

A. Krishna Vajjala, SM H. Mansur, J. Jose, and K. Moran. "MOTOREASE: Automated Detection of Motor Impairment Accessibility Issues in Mobile App UIs". In Proceedings of the 46th ACM International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2024), Lisbon, Portugal April 14-20, 2024. ARXIV Paper [PDF]

A. Krishna Vajjala, C. Badea, C. Bird, R. Deline, J. Entenmann, N. Forsgren, A. Hramadski, S. Sanyal, O. Surmachev, T. Zimmermann. "Enhancing Differential Testing: LLM-Powered Automation in Release Engineering". (In Review)

Aj. Krishna Vajjala, A. Krishna Vajjala, Z. Zhou, and D. Rosenblum. "Analyzing the Impact of Domain Similarity: A New Direction for Cross-Domain Recommendation". In Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Neural Networks (IJCNN), Yokohama, Japan, June 30 - July 5, 2024. Paper [PDF]

A. Krishna Vajjala and K. Moran. "Engineering Accessible Software". In Proceedings of the 39th IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance and Evolution (ICSME'23), Doctoral Symposium, Bogota, Colombia, 2023. [PDF]

S. Lin, A. Krishna Vajjala, and K. Moran. "SearchAccess: Advancing Accessibility in Android App Design Through a Deep Learning-Powered GUI-Based Search Engine." Journal of Student-Scientists' Research, vol. 5, October 27, 2023.


Experience

2024

Microsoft Research

Research Intern

June 2024 - August 2024

- Mentored by Dr. Christian Bird, Dr. Nicole Forsgren, and Dr. Rob Deline, I identified bottlenecks in the software deployment and build process, leveraging Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence to automate and streamline workflows for developers.
- Collaborated with developers to gather requirements, designing and building a user interface that integrates K-means clustering on build failures using Azure OpenAI embeddings. This groups failures for easy access and triage by on-call developers. Built with Python, Node.js, Flask, React, and supported by an Azure Kusto Database.
- Deployed custom Large Language Models (LLMs) within an information-secure Azure environment (OpenAi GPT-4o) to proactively tackle explainability, and traceability, significantly reducing manual inspection and fatigue.
- Extracted a set of generalizable design rules to gamify and redesign UI workflows, empowering teams to leverage AI for automating repetitive tasks, enhancing productivity, and minimizing manual efforts.
- Presented this project at an executive review with a Corporate Vice President (CVP), where the partner product team requested an immediate push to production and initiated a successful tech transfer due to its potential to improve developer efficiency. I aim to publish results demonstrating productivity increases for developers.

2022

George Mason University

Graduate Research Assistant

Summer '22 - present

- Identified the drought of developer facing tools that leverage Machine Learning techniques to make accessible Android applications
- Designed and implemented MotorEase, an automated tool to detect motor-impairment accessibility issues in mobile applications using Java and Python programming languages.
- Integrated state-of-the-art techniques in PyTorch computer vision, pattern-matching, and static analysis to detect various accessibility violations through application screenshots and XML data.
- Designed and implemented SearchAccess, a developer-facing search engine which facilitates the search of accessible User Interface Screens using Node.js and Flask backend and Python and React frontend.
- Designed a search functionality using CLIP Embeddings and Solr search indexing in conjunction with a MongoDB database and AWS S3 image storage server to perform a search of accessible Android UIs.

2021

Alcon

Research & Design Machine Learning Intern

Summer '21

- Worked on a Multi-Disciplinary team with researchers and surgeons that worked to prototype a surgical voice assistant
- Designed and implemented a wake-word for surgical voice assistants using Tensorflow, Sagemaker, S3, and current research in voice assistants after consulting with surgeons and hospitals about requirements. 
- Used Python, Librosa, PyAudio, and PyTorch to parse and classify windowed audio to detect the wake-word.
- Achieved 80\% accuracy on wake-word detection prototype in an input stream which exceeded expectations and is now in operation room devices across the US

2020

International Software Systems

Software Engineer Intern

Summer '20

- Developed a project to increase ease of communication between doctors and patients at hospitals by tracking calls, requirements, and patient to doctor communication
- Built a series of REST APIs using Node Js back-end, React front-end, and MongoDB database
- Lead weekly SCRUM meetings with offshore teams in development and integration into production

Academic Service

Invited Talks

  • DiffViewer: Infusion of AI/ML in developer workflows to improve productivity, Microsoft Research 2024
  • MotorEase: automated detection of Motor Impairment Issues, ICSE 2024
  • Engineering Accessible Software, ICSME 2023 Doctoral Symposium
  • MIRACLE: Automated Testing in Android Apps, GMU 2022
  • Emerging Research Poster Presentation: MIRACLE, GMU 2021

Media

  • "The Power of Positionality - Why Accessibility? An Interview With Kevin Moran and Arun Krishnavajjala" Read

Conference Co-Reviewing

  • ICSE 2025
  • MSR 2024
  • ICSE 2023
  • SANER 2023
  • ASE 2022
  • MSR 2022
  • SANER 2022

Mentorship

  • Samar Karanch | University of Central Florida
  • Sophia Lin | Thomas Jefferson HS
  • Justin Jose | South Lakes HS
  • Emma Tan | Bishop Moore Catholic High School

Personal Project

My Skills

Python 98%

Java 96%

Keras/Tensofrlow 90%

PyTorch 85%

React 85%

Node 85%

Hadoop 80%

AWS Sagemaker/EC2 92%

Apache Spark 85%

Photoshop 95%

Docker/Kubernetes 75%

C & C++ 85%

Lets work!

If you've made it this far, let's talk and get things rolling!

  • Satya Nadella

    "Our industry does not respect tradition. What it respects is innovation."

  • Larry Page

    "If you're changing the world, you're working on important things. You're excited to get up in the morning."

  • Steve Jobs

    "Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."

Contact Me

akrishn (at) gmu (dot) edu

Ashburn, VA

(703)-303-6284