Shaikh Shawon Arefin Shimon

Lecturer & On Leave

Ph. D, Computer Science, University of Waterloo (Ongoing)
Waterloo, ON, Canada (Sep 2021 – Present)

M.S, Computer Science, Colorado State University (CSU)
Fort Collins, CO, USA

B.Sc, Computer Science And Engineering (CSE), Bangladesh University of Engineering & Technology (BUET)
Dhaka, Bangladesh

Office hours:

On study leave (Fall 2021 – Present).


Email:
Website:
Google Scholar URL: https://scholar.google.ca/citations?user=JHiIjlcAAAAJ&hl=en
Scopus Profile: https://www.scopus.com/authid/detail.uri?authorId=57147941500

Biography

I joined ECE, NSU as a full-time faculty in April 2018. Before joining NSU ranks, I was a software engineer in Mobile devices and Electronic Design Automation industry across US and Asia for 6+ years. I obtained my B.Sc in Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technolgy (BUET); and went on to obtain an MS in Computer Science from Colorado State University (CSU), Fort Collins, Colorado, USA. During my time at CSU Fort Collins, I worked as a research assistant in Mobile Human-Computer Interaction area at Ruiz HCI Lab (Presently relocated to University of Florida Gainsville, USA) under Dr. Jaime Ruiz. Besides working as a full-time faculty at NSU ECE – I also worked as a Co-ordinator for School of Engineering and Physical Sciences (SEPS) at NSU Career and Placement Center (CPC), leading industry-academia collaboration for School of Engineering from 2018 to 2020.

Currently, I am a doctoral candidate in School of Computer Science (SCS), University of Waterloo, ON, Canada and on an academic leave from North South University.
My current research area focuses on exploring interaction modalities for gesture-sensing earable (i.e., ear-mounted wearable) devices. During my doctoral research, I collaborated with Huawei Human-Machine Interaction (HMI) lab in Markham, ON, Canada.
More info about my current research area and research group in University of Waterloo can be found here.

I am well experienced in Agile SCRUM/XP/Kanban, Incremental / RAD / V-model Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), Software Version Controlling, Software Project Management / Bug tracking / Quality Assurance process, and well-acquainted with Continuous Integration / Deployment (CI/CD) & build automation process. As a software engineer – I received best employee award at SRBD for Software Development work on Samsung Rex 70 Middle East Asia (MEA) release in 2013.

If you are considering approaching me for a Letter of Recommendation (LOR) for graduate school or professional reference, please read this guideline.

I can be reached via the following emails outside of NSU:

  • skshimon[at]alumni[dot]colostate[dot]edu
  • ssarefin[at]uwaterloo[dot]ca

Research Areas

Research Interests

Data Science & Analytics : Data Visualization & Interaction, Data Pipeline
Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) : Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Large Screen Surface Displays (Tabletops, Public Display, Automotive displays), Mobile & Wearable Devices & Interaction.
Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) : Collaborative Educational Technology
 Societal Computing : Computing Technology & Policy, Computing for Social Good

 

Teaching

Selected Publications

Journals
  • Shaikh Shawon Arefin Shimon, Ali Neshati, Junwei Sun, Qiang Xu, Jian Zhao, “Exploring Uni-manual Around Ear Off-Device Gestures for Earables,” Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies, Volume 8, Issue 1, 2024
Conference Papers
  • Shaikh Shawon Arefin Shimon , Courtney Lutton , Zichun Xu ,Sarah Morrison-Smith , Christina Boucher , Jaime Ruiz, “Exploring Non-touchscreen gestures for smartwatches,” CHI '16 , 2016
  • Shaikh Shawon Arefin Shimon , Sarah Morrison-Smith , Noah John , Ghazal Fahimi , Jaime Ruiz, “Exploring User-Defined Back-Of-Device Gestures for Mobile Devices,” MobileHCI'15, 2015
  • Mohammad Rayed, Tawfique Elahi, SHAIKH SHAWON AREFIN SHIMON, Nova Ahmed, “MFS Design in Appstore-enabled Smart Featurephones for Low-literate, Marginalized Communities,” CHI2023, 2023

Presentations at National & International Conferences

  • Exploring Above-neck Unimanual Swipe Gestures for Off-Device Earable Interaction 
    GI ‘26: Graphics Interface 2026, Waterloo, ON, Canada (June 2026)
  • Bare-Hand Continuous VR Locomotion Using Beyond-FOV, Around-HMD Unimanual Gestures
    GI ‘26: Graphics Interface 2026, Waterloo, ON, Canada (June 2026)
  • Exploring Uni-manual Around Ear Off-Device Gestures for Earables
    UbiComp/ISWC ‘24, Melbourne, Australia (October 2024)
  • Exploring Non-touchscreen Gestures for Smartwatches
    CHI ‘16, San Jose, CA, USA (May 2016)
  • Exploring User-Defined Back-Of-Device Gestures for Mobile Devices
    MobileHCI’15, Copenhagen, Denmark (August 2015)

Academic Awards & Recognitions

  • Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS), Ministry of Colleges and Universities (MCU), ON, Canada (January 2025 – December 2026)
  • President’s Graduate Scholarship (PGS), University of Waterloo, ON, Canada (January 2025 – December 2026)
  • Cheriton Research Symposium Poster Award, University of Waterloo, ON, Canada (October 2023)
  • David R. Cheriton Graduate Scholarship, University of Waterloo, ON, Canada (September 2021 – August 2022)
  • Graduate Entrance Scholarship, University of Waterloo, ON, Canada (September 2021 – August 2022)
  • Math Domestic Graduate Award, University of Waterloo, ON, Canada (September 2021 – December 2024)
  • Best Employee Of The Month, Samsung R&D Institute Bangladesh (SRBD), Dhaka, Bangladesh (March 2013)

Membership in Professional Organizations

Career coordinator, School of Engineering & Physical Science (SEPS)
Career & Placement Center (CPC), North South University
(June 2018- June 2020)

Other Academic Contributions at NSU or elsewhere