Hi, I'm Rahat Zaman
I'm a PhD student in the School of Computing at the University of Utah.

I am a Ph.D. student in the School of Computing at the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute, University of Utah, advised by Paul Rosen.

I received my M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Utah in 2025. I was a PhD Research Intern at Tableau (Salesforce) in 2026 and a PhD Data Visualization Intern at Epsilon in 2025. I plan to graduate in 2027.

My research studies how visualization can show the evidence behind AI outputs. Recent work looks at intermediate states of deep learning models (ChannelExplorer), analytical agents (Vela), and chart annotations (AnnoGram, AnnoBench, Blabber).

Updates

🗂️ Featured Projects

Vela Vela
Vela
Surfaces the intermediate analytical state of a conversational analytics agent so people can see how a result was derived and steer the analysis.
Data Visualization
Paper
AnnoBench AnnoBench
AnnoBench
A benchmark for visualization annotation generation that tests whether an annotation is readable, accurate, and visually consistent.
Data Visualization
arXiv
Blabber Blabber
Blabber
A declarative chart-annotation language. Authors state intent, and a compiler places marks, text, and connectors.
Data Visualization
Paper
Accessibility Auditor Site Accessibility Auditor
Accessibility Auditor
A Chrome DevTools extension that audits barriers across interaction states and compares visual, screen-reader, and keyboard order.
Data Visualization
Paper Repository
ChannelExplorer ChannelExplorer
ChannelExplorer
ChannelExplorer is an interactive visual analytics tool for exploring how deep neural network layers and activation channels contribute to class separability.
Data Visualization
ArXiv Repository
AnnoGram AnnoGram
AnnoGram
A declarative extension to the Grammar of Graphics that treats annotations as first-class design elements, allowing structured specification of targets, types, and positioning.
Data Visualization
ArXiv Repository
Wastewater Dashboard Wastewater Dashboard
Wastewater Dashboard
The Utah Wastewater Surveillance System tracks measles detection in wastewater samples statewide, showing detection dates and time frames relative to recent samples.
Data Visualization
ForeSITE linkeR Repository
Latent State Learning Experiment Latent State Learning Experiment
Latent State Learning Experiment
A jsPsych + Vite experiment studying latent state learning, context generalization, and behavioral flexibility with customizable trial sequences and telemetry.
ML
Experiment Link Repository

📚 Featured Publications

Beyond the Spinner: What Should Analytical Agents Surface While They Work?. Md. Rahat-Uz-Zaman, Srishti Palani, Dennis Bromley, Vidya Setlur. CHI, 2027 (submitted).
AnnoBench: A Benchmark for Visualization Annotation Generation. Md. Rahat-Uz-Zaman, Md Dilshadur Rahman, Andrew McNutt, Paul Rosen. EuroVis, 2026 (submitted). arXiv
ChannelExplorer: Exploring Class Separability Through Activation Channel Visualization. Md. Rahat-Uz-Zaman, Bei Wang, Paul Rosen. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 2026. DOI arXiv
AnnoGram: An Annotative Grammar of Graphics Extension. Md Dilshadur Rahman, Md. Rahat-Uz-Zaman, Andrew M McNutt, Paul Rosen. IEEE VIS, 2025. DOI arXiv
Visualizing Interaction Networks and Evidence in Biomedical Corpora. Enrique Noriega-Atala, Md. Rahat-Uz-Zaman, Ruchika Bhat, Mladen Jergovic, Stephen G. Kobourov, Janko Nikolich-Zugich. Pacific (formerly Asia-Pacific APVIS) Visualization Symposium, 2023. IEEE Conference

▶ Academic Awards

  •   Dean's Award   2nd, 3rd and 4th year, Dept. of CSE, KUET
  •   Vocational Scholarship   For all 4 years, Dept. of CSE, KUET
  •   Vocational Scholarship   For all 4 years, Dept. of CSE, KUET
  •   Top 10%   merit position in the class, Dept. of CSE, KUET
  •   Class Representative   For 3 consecutive years, Dept. of CSE, KUET
  •   1st in KUET   ITEE Level-2: FE Exam, Passer ID: FE2019OCT00049

▶ Technical Skills

Programming/Scripting/Markup Languages

LanguageProficiency
C, C++
Python
TypeScript
Javascript
Java
Rust
R
Bash
HTML
CSS

▶ Competitions and Awards

International

 📆 September, 2019
  •   4th   IEEE YESIST12 Maker Fair, Stamford International University, Bangkok, Thailand
    • Among 70 teams from 20 countries.
 📆 September, 2018
  •   Finalist   IEEE SS12 Innovation Challenge, NSBM Green University, Colombo Sri Lanka
    • Among 46 teams from 16 countries.
 📆 March, 2019
  •   Finalist   HULT Prize Regional Finale, MaGIC, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
    • 1,600,000 students from 120+ countries participated in the on-campus round to compete in the finale.
 📆 November, 2019
  •   2nd   Award Code Samurai Hackathon 2019, Dhaka University, Dhaka
    • Among 297 national teams.
 📆 November, 2019
  •   Runners up   Code Samurai Hackathon 2019, Dhaka University, Dhaka
    • Among 297 national teams.

▶ Competitive Programming

  •   Top 22%   Kaggle: Santander Customer Transaction Prediction

  • ACM ICPC Online Preliminary Contest
    Participated on 4 consecutive years contests.

    • 2020: 201st out of 1805 national teams.
    • 2019: 458th out of 1788 national teams.
    • 2018: 706th out of 1604 national teams.
    • 2017: 1109th out of 1454 national teams.

 📆 2019
  •   Best 2k15 Team   Intra KUET Programming Contest, KUET, Khulna
    • Among 120+ teams
 📆 2016
  •   15th   Intra KUET Programming Contest, KUET, Khulna
    • Among 100+ teams

▶ Languages

LanguageProficiency
BengaliNative Proficiency
EnglishProfessional Working Proficiency
JapaneseJLPT N4 Level
HindiProfessional Working Proficiency

Last compiled: September 28, 2026 at 1:43 AM MDT

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