Siaufung "Bosco" Tjan (曾学锋, January 21, 1966 – December 2, 2016) was a

Chinese-American Chinese Americans are Americans of Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans have ancestors from mainland China, Hong Kong ...

psychologist A psychologist is a professional who practices psychology and studies mental states, perceptual, cognitive, emotional, and social processes and behavior. Their work often involves the experimentation, observation, and explanation, interpretatio ...

and

neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist specializing in neuroscience that deals with the anatomy and function of neurons, Biological neural network, neural circuits, and glia, and their Behavior, behavioral, biological, and psycholo ...

. He was a professor of psychology at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in ...

's Dornsife College of Letters, Arts & Sciences.

Education

Born in

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

to Indonesian-born parents, Tjan moved from

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

to the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

as a teenager. He received his bachelor's degree in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

from the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States. Two branch campuses are in the Kansas City metropolitan area on the Kansas side: the university's medical school and hospital ...

in 1987 and his Ph.D. in computer and information science from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

in 1997. His PhD thesis was entitled "Ideal Observer Analysis of Object Recognition".

Career

From 1990 to 1996, Tjan worked as a research assistant at the University of Minnesota. He joined the

(USC) as an assistant professor in the psychology department in 2001. He was promoted to associate professor there in 2008 and to full professor in 2015. At USC, he co-founded the Dornsife Cognitive Neuroscience Imaging Center, and served as its co-director at the time of his death. He directed the Laboratory for Functional and Computational Vision at USC. He also served in the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong from 2008-2014.

Research interests

Tjan was known for researching the responses people have to

vision loss Visual or vision impairment (VI or VIP) is the partial or total inability of visual perception. In the absence of treatment such as corrective eyewear, assistive devices, and medical treatment, visual impairment may cause the individual difficul ...

caused by multiple conditions, such as

macular degeneration Macular degeneration, also known as age-related macular degeneration (AMD or ARMD), is a medical condition which may result in blurred vision, blurred or vision loss, no vision in the center of the visual field. Early on there are often no sym ...

. A page on the USC website stated that his research objective was to study the "human visual system to address basic and translational questions pertaining to vision loss, restoration, and rehabilitation.”

Death

On December 2, 2016, Tjan was fatally stabbed by a USC student; soon afterward, one of his graduate students was arrested on suspicion of having carried out the stabbing. His body was found inside the

Seeley G. Mudd Seeley Greenleaf Mudd, M.D. (April 18, 1895 – March 10, 1968) was an American physician, professor, and major philanthropist to academic institutions. Early life Mudd was born in Denver, Colorado in 1895, and was the son of noted mining engine ...

Building, where he worked, after which he was pronounced dead. Tjan was 50 years old. Authorities reportedly believe a student killed Tjan as the result of a personal dispute, but police have not yet established a motive. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Leslie A. Swain ruled on January 30, 2018 that former graduate student David Jonathan Brown was not guilty by reason of insanity for the first-degree murder of USC professor Bosco Tjan, according to the L.A. County District Attorney’s office.

References

External links

Faculty page
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tjan, Bosco 1966 births 2016 deaths 2016 murders in the United States American academics of Chinese descent 20th-century American psychologists Indonesian people of Chinese descent American people of Chinese-Indonesian descent University of Southern California faculty University of Kansas alumni University of Minnesota alumni Deaths by stabbing in California American neuroscientists Chinese emigrants to the United States Educators from Beijing Scientists from Beijing 21st-century American psychologists American social scientists of Asian descent Chinese people of Indonesian descent