Michael Wu PhD

Scientist / Researcher / Mathematician / Statistician

Michael Wu is the Principal Scientist of Analytics at Lithium Technologies Inc. Michael received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley’s Biophysics graduate program, where he modeled visual processing within the human brain using math, physics, and machine learning. He is currently applying similar data-driven methodologies to investigate and understand the complex dynamics of the social web. Michael has developed the Facebook Engagement Index (FEI), Community Health Index (CHI) and many predictive social analytics with actionable insights. His R&D work at Lithium has won him the recognition as a 2010 Influential Leader by CRM Magazine.

In addition to the purely empirical methods, Michael also leverages social principles that govern human behavior (from sociology and anthropology, to behavioral economics and psychology, etc.) to decipher the intricate human components of social interactions. Through this combined bottom-up and top-down approach, Michael has developed a sophisticated predictive model of influence and an evaluative framework for understanding gamification. To tackle challenging open problems (like the value of WOM, social ROI, or the loyalty implications of gamification, etc.), Michael collaborates with academicians to conduct research on these unsolved problems. His research and insights has been compiled and published in “The Science of Social,” an e-book for business audience.

Michael has been a DOE fellow during his graduate career and was awarded 4 years of full fellowship under the Computational Science Graduate Fellowship. During his fellowship tenure, he has served at the Los Alamos National Lab conducting research in face recognition. Prior to his Ph.D., Michael received his triple major undergraduate degree in Applied Math, Physics, and Molecular & Cell Biology from UC Berkeley.