Pallavi Desai

Pallavi Desai

MSCS at UT Austin · ML Researcher · Founder · Inventor

I am Pallavi Desai, a rising second year MSCS student at UT Austin. I graduated as a SEED Scholar from UC Berkeley majoring in Data Science with a minor in Science, Technology, and Society and a certificate in Entrepreneurship and Technology from the Sutardja Dai Center.

I am currently working on my own startup, AI March Assist, which uses patented technology for a thin screen that displays sheet music and uses GPS tracking to provide marching bands with individualized, real-time feedback.

My curiosity and motivation have led me to explore different roles and disciplines over the course of my academic career thus far. My experiences and interests have prepared me well to be an asset on any team, so please reach out if you would like to learn more about me!

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Research & Patents

U.S. Patent #10,885,891 · Jan 2020–Present

System, Method and Apparatus for Directing a Presentation of a Musical Score via Artificial Intelligence

A thin, lightweight electronic display for sheet music using Real-Time Kinematic tracking and AI-based telemetric assessment to provide marching bands with individualized, real-time feedback for music and marching performance.

AIMarchAssist

U.S. Patent #11,289,058 · Continuation · Mar 2022

System, Method and Apparatus for Directing a Presentation of a Musical Score Using Artificial Intelligence

Continuation patent extending the original AIMarchAssist invention, an AI-driven system providing real-time, individualized feedback for marching band music and movement performance.

AIMarchAssist

Pre-Publication · Aug–Dec 2025

Towards Interpretable Models of Rumor Spread in LLM-Driven Agent Societies

Examining how rumors spread and what network features accelerate or hinder them using graph theory and LLM-agent simulations. Collaboration with Rahul Nandakumar, PhD (McCombs School of Business). Submission to journal expected summer 2026.

Research Roles

Graduate Research Assistant Jan–May 2026
DynamiCog Lab · UT Austin

Collaborated with Dr. Nicholas Duran and another student to analyze secure messages between patients and healthcare providers to improve patient-centered outcomes and enhance comparative effectiveness research dissemination in practice. Utilized LLMs to conduct Named Entity Recognition on a synthetic dataset to remove personally identifiable information, in collaboration with the University of California, San Francisco and Kaiser Permanente.

Fung Fellow Aug–Dec 2024
Fung Institute for Engineering Leadership · UC Berkeley

Partnered with Reclaim Our Power to develop an interactive GIS-based virtual resource addressing high utility costs and environmental dangers by PG&E. Built dynamic visualizations using ArcGIS software.

Undergraduate Research Assistant Sep–Dec 2022
Trademark Rebranding Project · UC Berkeley

Collaborated with a team led by Prof. Sonia Katyal to synthesize 12-column data on why public companies choose to rebrand from a series of 3,000 articles over the last 20 years. Assembled a subset of over 150 articles from the last 12 years to conduct NLP analysis to determine rebranding motives.

Undergraduate Research Assistant Jan–May 2022
Micro Lab · Haas Business School, UC Berkeley

Examined online vs. in-person interaction, the nonverbal detection of racial bias, the tendency to delay gratification, and other projects, including coding nonverbal behaviors for Dr. Dana Carney. Investigated why powerful people are better liars and the outcomes of power and stress through a preliminary literature review of 10 articles from 2012 or later related to these topics.

Experience

Machine Learning Engineer Intern

American Express
Jun–Aug 2024
  • Conditioned 1.5 years of Slack messages for an intent classification model on Google Cloud Platform. Trained a Multinomial Naive Bayes model and fine-tuned hyperparameters to improve accuracy from 22% to 61%.
  • Built training dataset of 120 keyword-intent pairs from scratch; verified results using K-Fold Cross Validation.
  • Presented findings to SVP-level audience; later presented a poster at the 2024 SEED Scholars Research Symposium.

Founder & CEO

AIMarchAssist
Aug 2023–Present
  • Led team of 2 to develop patented marching band technology. Selected as 1 of 22 out of 150 for Berkeley's Student Entrepreneurship Program.
  • Calculated TAM and SAM; conducted 50+ customer interviews by cold-emailing student groups and band directors.

Data Scientist Intern

American Express
Jun–Aug 2023
  • Synthesized 4 years of user feedback from an internal Slack channel to consolidate pain points for the Cornerstone Interactive Analytics platform.
  • Designed a lexicon-based sentiment analysis algorithm using NLTK's Vader to create a Bag of Words model across 20,000 lines of feedback, surfacing accurate sentiment scores and word frequencies for 14 Product Managers.

Product Management Intern

You.com
Jun–Aug 2022
  • Managed and modernized the Social Search feature of a privacy-based LLM aggregator. Made 15–20 feature enhancements based on 50+ user interviews.
  • Increased Social Search traffic by 159% in 2 months. Presented to C-suite and implemented executive feedback directly.

Education

University of Texas at Austin

2025–Present

M.S. in Computer Science

College of Natural Sciences · Thesis Advisor: Dr. Risto Miikkulainen

Coursework

Generative Models · Databases and LLMs · Machine Learning on Real World Networks · Grounded NLP · Distributed Computing

University of California, Berkeley

Class of 2025

B.A. in Data Science

College of Computing, Data Science, and Society · SEED Scholars Honors Program · Minor in Science, Technology, & Society · Certificate in Entrepreneurship and Technology (Sutardja Center)

Coursework

Data Engineering · Inferencing, Modeling & Decision Making · Probability for DS · Data Structures & Algorithms

Leadership

Incoming Co-President

Aug 2025–Present
UT Graduate Representative Association of CS (GRACS)

Elected Co-President for Fall 2026. Previously First Year Liaison Officer. Created UTCoffeeChat, a mentorship platform for MS/PhD students. Conducted climate survey presented to Dr. Peter Stone.

Operations Manager & Teaching Assistant

Aug 2024–May 2025
Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology · UC Berkeley

Coordinated workshops for SCET Innovators in Residence as Peer Startup Coach. Taught 13 students at the Startup Ideation & Ecosystems Workshop; designed curriculum from scratch. Workshops consistently ranked most enjoyed activity.

Senior Mentor

Aug 2022–May 2025
Berkeley Mentorship Cohort

Mentored 2 freshmen per year for 3 years with individualized support on academics, research, and internships. Held weekly one-on-ones; received the Community Award (1 of 95 mentors) in 2023.

Senior Member

Aug 2023–May 2025
CDSS Undergraduate Student Advisory Board · UC Berkeley

Appointed to the new College of CDSS's advisory board. Planned orientation activities and pitched a college-wide mentorship program for incoming students.

Competitive Member

Aug 2022–Jul 2025
Cal Equestrian Team

Mentored new riders; placed 3rd out of 11 at UC Santa Cruz IHSA competition (Nov 2024). Cal Equestrian received Reserve Champion at Fall 2022 and 2024 competitions. Completed a month-long training program in Córdoba, Argentina (Jul 2025), placing 3rd out of 15.

Honors & Awards

SEED Scholar

Jul 2021–May 2025
STEM Excellence Through Equity and Diversity Honors Program · UC Berkeley

Engaged in a 6-week Summer Rising program covering Data Science, Algebra, Psychology, and Biology. Fostered collaboration with 25 scholars on DE&I in STEM.

Most Promising Innovation Award

May 2024
Designing Startups to Transform Society Pitch Competition · UC Berkeley

Collaborated with a team of 5 to conceptualize a personal data tracking app, validated through 30+ customer interviews. Received the Most Promising Innovation Award out of 13 teams.

Community Award

Apr 2023
Berkeley Mentorship Cohort

Awarded to 1 out of 95 mentors for an extraordinary demonstration of equity and inclusion values. Presented by Dean Tsu-Jae King Liu. Nominated by a mentee.

Skills & Interests

Technical

Python SQL Java MongoDB Git NumPy SciPy Matplotlib Scikit-Learn NLTK SpaCy

Languages

Nepali Spanish Hindi Gujarati

Interests

Flute · Reading · Aviation · Photography · Live Music · Cooking · Traveling · Running