About Us

Soyoung Choi, PhD, RN

Director of Accessible Healthcare Lab

I’m Dr. Soyoung Choi, an Assistant Professor and Director of the Accessible Healthcare Lab at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). With a background in nursing, including three years of hands-on experience at a university hospital, I bring both clinical expertise and research insight to our work in accessible healthcare for blind and low-vision individuals.

My academic journey includes earning my Master of Science in Nursing from Yonsei University in South Korea and my Ph.D. in Nursing from Pennsylvania State University. This diverse educational background has shaped my perspective on inclusive healthcare solutions.

Currently, I lead the EXVIA (EXercise for Visual Impairments and Aging) project, funded by UIUC. Our research team is dedicated to developing accessible audible exercise resources specifically designed for blind individuals to use in their home environment. Our work focuses on addressing key health challenges faced by the blind community through carefully crafted, audio-based exercise guidance.

The EXVIA project represents our commitment to making exercise accessible to everyone, regardless of visual ability. We believe that clear, well-designed verbal instructions can empower blind individuals to maintain an active lifestyle and improve their overall health outcomes.

JooYoung Seo, PhD

Dr. JooYoung Seo leads the (x)Ability Design Lab, where their research focuses on accessibility research. He is an assistant professor in the School of Information Sciences and a faculty affiliate in the Department of Computer Science, Informatics Institute, and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Seo is also an RStudio double-certified data science instructor and accessibility expert certified by the International Association of Accessibility Professionals (IAAP). His research topics involve accessible computing, universal design, inclusive data science, and equitable healthcare technologies. As an emerging learning scientist and information scientist, his research focuses particularly on how to make computational literacy more accessible to people with dis/abilities by using multimodal data representation.

He has worked on various research and development projects on accessible computing and open-source data science packages (e.g., gt; shiny; rmarkdown to name a few) for accessibility. His research projects have involved not just web accessibility, but also human-centered design and development studies, including inclusive makerspaces, tangible block-based programming, accessible data science (e.g., data tactualization, sonification, and verbalization), and accessible/reproducible scientific writing tools for people with and without dis/abilities.

Hyun Seo Ko, MS

Doctoral Researcher & BASI Certified Pilates Instructor

Hyun Seo Ko is a certified BASI Pilates instructor and doctoral researcher at the Accessible Healthcare Lab, UIUC. She completed her Bachelor’s in Education at Ewha Womans University and Master’s in Sports Medicine at Kyung Hee University.

With three years of experience as a Pilates instructor and over 500 hours of specialized training, she combines practical expertise with academic research. Her current work focuses on developing an accessible Pilates framework for blind women, integrating tactile cues and audio guidance for safe, personalized home workouts.

Diego Soto, MS

Doctoral Researcher

Diego Soto is a doctoral researcher at the Accessible Healthcare Lab, UIUC. He completed his Bachelor’s of Science in Exercise Science with a minor in Sociology at Illinois State University. He also completed his Master’s of Science in Exercise Physiology at Illinois State University. He has over two years of experience in exercise training, programing, and rehabilitation for various special populations (e.g., Pregnant women, those with neurological disorders, those with musculoskeletal disorders, and athletes). His current work focuses on developing safe and accessible exercise programs for those with visual impairments.