I'm an aspiring software developer and hobbyist programmer currently based in Vancouver, Canada. Programming has been my main productive hobby since early 2017, and I've been working on personal projects and participating in community events (hackathons, programming competitions, and game jams) since then. Building software and solving interesting design problems activates the happy parts of my brain. I especially like building things that are useful for people.
I've recently recovered from health issues which caused severe limitations from 2023 to 2024, and I'm excited to get back to work. Prior to this, I was a mathematics graduate student with the Layton lab at the University of Waterloo from 2020 to 2023 where I studied kidneys using mathematical modelling.
Currently, I am looking for full-time employment in a software development role. Most of my experience is with full-stack development, but I'm very interested in exploring domains outside of web development.
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Sep 2020–Sep 2023
University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada
Graduate teaching assistant
- Led tutorial sessions for sections of 25–50 undergraduate mathematics students for 100 to 300-level mathematics courses
- Developed and delivered short lectures and provided individualized support for students during tutorials
- Worked with instructors to develop marking schemes for assignments and exams
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May 2018–Dec 2018
BC Cancer: Shah Lab, Vancouver, Canada
Bioinformatics software engineer (co-op position)
- Created a central piece of the lab's software infrastructure independently with minimal supervision (see "saltant" in the projects section below)
- Developed and maintained two large genomic databases as part of a small team
- Performed data analysis on genomic datasets using Python and R
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May 2017–Aug 2017
SFU: Work-study with Dr. Craig Scratchley,
Burnaby, Canada
Copy editor (work-study position)
- Improved readability, consistency, and correctness of the open-source MATLAB textbook Physical Modeling in MATLAB by Allen Downey
- Revised underlying LaTeX source code for greater robustness and legibility
- Programming languages: Proficient with Python, JavaScript (ES15), and shell scripting. Familiar with C++. Some experience with C, Haskell, TypeScript, R, and Lua.
- Web development (backend): Proficient with Django and Django REST framework. Familiar with Nginx.
- Web development (frontend): Proficient with Pug and many CSS frameworks (Bootstrap, Spectre.css). Familiar with D3.js. Some experience with React.
- Development tools: Proficient with Git and Unix shell. Some experience with Docker, Singularity, and Ansible.
- Web services: Familiar with Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, Azure Virtual Machines, Azure Blob Storage, Travis CI, AppVeyor, Codecov, and Rollbar. Some experience with Amazon Route 53.
- Mathematics software/libraries: Familiar with MATLAB, Maple, many Python libraries (NumPy, SciPy, pandas, Matplotlib, seaborn), and many R libraries (ggplot2, tidyverse packages).
- Document-preparation software: Proficient with LaTeX, Sphinx, and Microsoft Office.
Personal projects
- 2025: Super Mario 64 Route Optimizer – Super Mario 64 route optimizer
- 2022: hand-frequency-scraper – interactive visualizations for poker hand data
- 2021: dbd-reminders – email notifier for Dead by Daylight perks and codes
- 2021: kidney-arterial-tree – interactive visualization for kidney arterial networks
- 2021: poker-plots – interactive visualizations for poker game data
- 2019: AvalonBot – The Resistance: Avalon Discord bot
- 2019: avalon-vote-tracker – The Resistance: Avalon vote tracking app
- 2019: fooskill – foosball league and leaderboard app
- 2019: slats – utility to add locally saved music to Spotify
- 2018: Mario 64 Rivals – Super Mario 64 speedrun leaderboards site
- 2018: meowder – dating site for cats
- 2018: rpi-led-lightshow – Raspberry Pi LED light show
- 2018: twitch-game-notify – desktop Twitch notifier
- 2017: jrnl – personal journal manager
- 2017: mattwiens.ca – this webpage
- 2017: transfat – utility to make music files compatible with my car stereo
Hackathons and game jams
- 2020: Avise (24 hours) – substance monitoring app
- 2019: Picify (24 hours) – playlist creation app using "vibes" of uploaded images
- 2019: space_MAGE_ (48 hours) – resource management/side-scrolling shooter hybrid game
- 2018: CommonRank (24 hours) – custom leaderboard creation app
- 2018: mindr (24 hours) – automated nanny app using ML emotion detection
Coding competitions
- 2017–2019: coding-competitions – collection of competition results and code
Work projects
- 2018: Colossus – genomics cell sample database
- 2018: jira-ticket-migrate – tool for migrating tickets between Jira servers
- 2018: saltant – distributed task runner and manager
- 2018: saltant-cli – saltant CLI
- 2018: saltant-py – saltant SDK for Python
- 2018: shahwebsite – website for Dr. Sohrab Shah's research group at BC Cancer
- 2018: Tantalus – genomic file database and transfer manager
- 2017: Physical Modeling in MATLAB – open-source MATLAB textbook
Big open source projects (as contributor)
- 2018: Toil – pipeline management system
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Sep 2020–Sep 2023
University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada
- Partial completion of Master of Mathematics in Applied Mathematics
- Received NSERC CGS M scholarship
- GPA 90.67/100
- Note: voluntarily withdrew due to severe health issues
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Sep 2015–Aug 2020
Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada
- Bachelor of Science (Honours First Class with Distinction)
- Honours in Applied Mathematics, Minor in Physics
- Received Undergraduate Dean's Medal (Faculty of Science)
- GPA 4.21/4.33
- Fall 2021 $17,500 | [NSERC] Alexander Graham Bell Canada Graduate Scholarship
- Fall 2021 $5000 | [UW] President’s Graduate Scholarship
- Spring 2021 [SFU] Undergraduate Dean’s Medal (Faculty of Science)
- Fall 2020 $10,000 | [UW] Cathleen Morawetz Graduate Entrance Scholarship
- Fall 2020 $2000 | [UW] Math Domestic Graduate Award
- Spring 2020 $1125 | [SFU] Department of Mathematics Award
- Fall 2019 $1210 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Summer 2019 $2600 | [SFU] Dueck Auto Group President's Scholarship
- Summer 2019 $1320 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Summer 2019 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Spring 2019 $1000 | [SFU] Department of Mathematics Award
- Spring 2019 $1000 | [IEEE] John Deane Scholarship
- Spring 2019 $1000 | SFU Retirees Association 50th Anniversary Scholarship
- Spring 2019 $1320 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Spring 2019 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Spring 2018 $180 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Fall 2017 $500 | [SFU] Mrs. Shakuntala Goel Memorial Scholarship
- Fall 2017 $1000 | SFU Alumni Scholarship
- Fall 2017 $1400 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Fall 2017 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Summer 2017 $2500 | [SFU] Dueck Chevrolet Oldsmobile Cadillac Ltd. President's Scholarship
- Summer 2017 $1200 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Summer 2017 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Spring 2017 $1000 | SFU Alumni Scholarship
- Spring 2017 $1080 | SFU Undergraduate Open Scholarship
- Spring 2017 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Fall 2016 $1000 | SFU Alumni Scholarship
- Fall 2016 [SFU] President’s and Dean’s Honour Roll
- Fall 2015 $3500 | [SFU] Ken Caple College Transfer Entrance Scholarship
Publications I've co-authored are listed below. Alternatively, see my Google Scholar profile or my ORCID iD.
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Clonal Decomposition and DNA Replication States Defined by
Scaled Single-Cell Genome Sequencing
- Emma Laks, Andrew McPherson, Hans Zahn, ... , Matt Wiens, et al.
- Cell, 2019.
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Dissociation of solid tumour tissues with cold active
protease for single-cell RNA-seq minimizes conserved
collagenase associated stress responses
- Ciara H. O'Flanagan, Kieran R. Campbell, Allen W. Zhang, ... , Matt Wiens, et al.
- Genome Biology, 2019.
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Probabilistic cell-type assignment of single-cell RNA-seq
for tumor microenvironment profiling
- Allen W. Zhang, Ciara O'Flanagan, Elizabeth A. Chavez, ... , Matt Wiens, et al.
- Nature Methods, 2019.