PhD student · UCLA ECE
Hi, I’m Efe.
Mehmet Efe Lorasdagi
I’m a PhD student in Electrical and Computer Engineering at UCLA, advised by Prof. Vwani Roychowdhury.
I work on language models, reinforcement learning, and neural signal processing. I’m interested in how learning systems can improve with experience—from post-training language models to making sense of neural recordings.
Before UCLA, I completed my bachelor’s and master’s at Bilkent University, where I worked with Prof. Süleyman S. Kozat. I also spent two years building machine learning and retrieval systems at Databoss.
What I’m working on
Research interestsLanguage models & agents
LLM post-training, reinforcement learning, and information retrieval. Recent work includes controlled deep research through generative semantic workspaces.
Learning from neural signals
Deep learning for spike sorting, population event modeling, and multimodal models for understanding pathologic movements.
Learning over time
Continual learning, adaptive feature selection, and experience replay for continuous control.
A few recent updates
- Mentored the Aerospace Corporation project in the IPAM Research in Industrial Projects for Students (RIPS) program.
- Our seizure semiology paper was accepted for a poster presentation at IEEE EMBC.
- Started my PhD at UCLA, supported by an ECE departmental fellowship.
Along the way
Full CV ↗Education
- UCLA 2025–present
- PhD, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Bilkent University 2023–2025
- MS, Electrical and Electronics Engineering
- Bilkent University 2019–2023
- BS, Electrical and Electronics Engineering
Experience & service
- Databoss 2023–2025
- Machine Learning Engineer · Prediction, retrieval and agentic LLM systems
- Fraunhofer IIS Summer 2022
- Research Intern · Text-to-speech and GPU inference optimization
- Teaching
- Former Bilkent industrial design project TA