Matthew Hull

Ph.D. Student (ML + Simulation)

I am a Ph.D. student in Machine Learning at Georgia Tech advised by Duen Horng (Polo) Chau. My research focuses on adversarial machine learning and simulation with differentiable rendering. I’ve also been a professional pilot for 20+ years and currently captain the Boeing 767 at FedEx.

Education

May. 2023 —
Ph.D. in Machine Learning
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Jan. 2015 — May 2018
M.S. in Computer Science
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Aug. 2000 — May 2004
B.M. in Piano Performance
Samford University, Birmingham, AL

Academic Research Experience

June 2023 — Present
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
PhD Researcher
PhD Researcher working on machine learning and data visualization projects.
May 2021 — May 2023
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Instructional Associate Researcher
Instructional Associate Researcher supporting teaching and research efforts.
May 2021 — May 2023
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Instructional Associate
Instructional Associate assisting in large-scale courses and academic projects.

Industry Experience

Aug. 2016 — Present
FedEx Express, Cologne, Germany | Oakland, CA
Pilot - Captain, Boeing 767 Aircraft
Captain on the Boeing 767 aircraft, responsible for international and domestic flight operations.
Jan. 2014 — Aug. 2016
ExpressJet Airlines, Atlanta, GA
Manager - Advanced Qualification Program
Manager for the Advanced Qualification Program, overseeing pilot training data and compliance.
May 2007 — Dec. 2013
ExpressJet Airlines, Houston, TX
Lead Ground and Simulator Instructor
Lead Ground and Simulator Instructor for the Embraer 145 Aircraft, providing training for new and current pilots.
May 2006 — Aug. 2016
ExpressJet Airlines, Houston, TX
Pilot - Captain, Embraer 145 Aircraft
Captain on the Embraer 145 aircraft, responsible for regional airline operations.

Honors and Awards

2023
Google Research Award
Co-authored winning proposal for scaling up educators' capacities by automating visualization assessment via generative AI
2022
Outstanding Instructional Associate - Georgia Tech, College of Computing
As co-head TA of CSE 6242 - Data and Visual Analytics
2021
Best Poster Award at IEEE VIS Conference
For "Towards Automatic Grading of D3.js Visualizations"

Publications

Journal

J1
VisGrader: Automatic Grading of D3 Visualizations
Matthew Hull, Vivian Pednekar, Hannah Murray, Nimisha Roy, Emmanuel Tung, Susanta Routray, Connor Guerin, Justin Chen, Zijie J. Wang, Seongmin Lee, Mahdi Roozbahani, and Duen Horng Chau
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG), Melbourne, Australia, 2023.

Conference

C1
RenderBender: A Survey on Adversarial Attacks Using Differentiable Rendering
Matthew Hull, Haoran Wang, Matthew Lau, Alec Helbling, Mansi Phute, Chao Zhang, Zsolt Kira, Willian Lunardi, Martin Andreoni, Wenke Lee, and Duen Horng Chau
International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI), Montréal, Canada, 2025.
C2
Robust Principles: Architectural Design Principles for Adversarially Robust CNNs
ShengYun Peng, Weilin Xu, Cory Cornelius, Matthew Hull, Kevin Li, Rahul Duggal, Mansi Phute, Jason Martin, and Duen Horng (Polo) Chau
British Machine Vision Conference (BMVC), Aberdeen, UK, 2023.
C3
Argo Lite: Open-Source Interactive Graph Exploration and Visualization in Browsers
Siwei Li, Zhiyan Zhou, Anish Upadhayay, Omar Shaikh, Scott Freitas, Haekyu Park, Zijie J Wang, Susanta Routray, Matthew Hull, and Duen Horng Chau
Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM), Virtual, 2020.

Workshop

W1
3D Gaussian Splat Vulnerabilities
Matthew Hull, Haoyang Yang, Pratham Mehta, Mansi Phute, Aeree Cho, Haoran Wang, Matthew Lau, Wenke Lee, Willian Lunardi, Martin Andreoni, and Duen Horng Chau
CVPR Workshop on Neural Fields Beyond Conventional Cameras (NFBCC), Nashville, TN, 2025.

Poster

P1
Revamp: Automated Simulations of Adversarial Attacks on Arbitrary Objects in Realistic Scenes
Matthew Hull and Zijie J. Wang and Duen Horng Chau
International Conference on Learning Representations (Tiny Papers at ICLR), Vienna, Austria, 2024.
P2
LLM Self Defense
Mansi Phute, Alec Helbling, Matthew Hull, ShengYun Peng, Sebastian Szyller, Cory Cornelius, and Duen Horng Chau
International Conference on Learning Representations (Tiny Papers at ICLR), Vienna, Austria, 2024.
P3
Towards Automatic Grading of D3.js Visualizations
Matthew Hull, Connor Guerin, Justin Chen, Susanta Routray, Duen Horng (Polo) Chau
IEEE Visualization Conference (VIS), Virtual, 2021.

Preprint

P1
ComplicitSplat: Downstream Models are Vulnerable to Blackbox Attacks by 3D Gaussian Splat Camouflages
Matthew Hull, Haoyang Yang, Pratham Mehta, Mansi Phute, Aeree Cho, Haoran Wang, Matthew Lau, Wenke Lee, Willian Lunardi, Martin Andreoni, and Duen Horng Chau
arXiv, 2025.

Talks

RenderBender: A Survey on Adversarial Attacks Using Differentiable Rendering
Aug. 2025
International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence
Oct. 2024
Georgia Tech Ph.D. Qualifying Oral Exam
REVAMP: Automated Simulations of Adversarial Attacks on Arbitrary Objects in Realistic Scenes
Feb. 2024
2nd Workshop on Deployable AI (DAI) at AAAI
VisGrader: Automatic Grading of D3 Visualizations
Oct. 2023
IEEE Visualization
Flying Cargo During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Sep. 2022
Palo Alto University Rotary Club, Palo Alto, CA, USA
Line Oriented Evaluation Design
Oct. 2015
Advanced Qualification Program Working Group, Las Vegas, NV, USA
Tactical Reporting of Advanced Qualification Program Training Data
Apr. 2015
World Airline Training Symposium, Orlando, FL, USA
Reason Code & Instructor Comments Data Analysis Methodology
Feb. 2015
Advanced Qualification Program Working Group, Dallas, TX, USA

Teaching

Aug. 2019 - Present
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Head Teaching Assistant / Instructional Associate — Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242)
Served as Head Teaching Assistant and Instructional Associate for Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242), coordinating course logistics, managing teaching staff, and supporting 1200+ students each semester.
Aug. 2018 - May 2019
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Teaching Assistant / Instructional Associate — Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242)
Served as Teaching Assistant and Instructional Associate for Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242), supporting 900+ students each semester with assignments, office hours, and project mentoring.
Jan. 2018 - May. 2018
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Graduate Teaching Assistant — Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242)
Graduate Teaching Assistant for Data and Visual Analytics (CSE 6242), mentoring student teams, holding office hours, and assisting with coursework for 800+ students.
Jan. 2016 - Aug. 2016
ExpressJet Airlines, Houston, TX
Simulator Instructor — Embraer 145 Aircraft
Simulator Instructor for the Embraer 145 Aircraft, conducting training sessions for pilots on flight operations and procedures.
Jan. 2012 - Dec. 2013
ExpressJet Airlines, Houston, TX
Lead Ground Instructor — Embraer 145 Aircraft
Lead Ground Instructor for the Embraer 145 Aircraft, overseeing curriculum development and conducting classroom training for pilot trainees.
Jul. 2007 - Dec. 2012
ExpressJet Airlines, Houston, TX
Ground Instructor — Embraer 145 Aircraft
Ground Instructor for the Embraer 145 Aircraft, delivering ground school lessons on aircraft systems and operations.

Service

Reviewer
International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI) (IJCAI) 2025
ACM International Conference on Information & Knowledge Management (CIKM) (CIKM) 2020
Member
2021 — Present
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Certifications

Boeing 757 / 767 Type Rating
Boeing 737 Type Rating
Embraer 135/145 Type Rating
Airline Transport Pilot
Certified Flight Instructor - Single Engine, Multi Engine, Instrument
Remote Pilot - Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems

References

Dr. Polo Chau, Professor
School of Computational Science and Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
School of Computational Science and Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
James Barbour, Director - Flight Standards and Training
Flight Standards and Training
Avelo Airlines