Ruowei XIAO is an assistant professor at the School of Design, Southern University of Science and Technology. Her research has been focused on the interdisciplinary domain of design and human computer interaction (HCI), specifically, IoT-based embodied interaction, extended reality and gamification. She has a growing record of first-authored papers published in top HCI and gamification journals and conferences, such as IJHCI and CHI Play. 

Previously, she obtained a B.E of Information Security Engineering and a B.A of Animation Production from Shanghai Jiao Tong University. After that, she acquired a MEXT scholarship from the Japanese government and continued her graduate study at Keio University, Japan, where she obtained her M.S and Ph.D of Media Design. Prior to joining SUSTech, she worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the Gamification Group of Tampere University, Finland. In addition, she is also an Indie Game developer and has worked for one of the major Japanese game manufacturers, KOEI TECMO Games.