I am a research scientist at Meta Reality Labs Research. Previously, I was a PhD student in computer science at Texas A&M. My research interests include 3D human reconstruction, motion synthesis, and virtual reality. Prior to this, I was a software engineer working on 3D virtual surgery simulation at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Email: nicholas.milef [at] tamu.edu

Publications

Learning Fast 3D Gaussian Splatting Rendering using Continuous Level of Detail

Nicholas Milef, Dario Seyb, Todd Keeler, Thu Nguyen‐Phuoc, Aljaž Božič, Sushant Kondguli, Carl Marshall

Eurographics (2025)

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Project Page

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Code

Towards Unstructured Unlabeled Optical Mocap: A Video Helps!

Nicholas Milef, John Keyser, Shu Kong

SIGGRAPH (2024)

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Variational pose prediction with dynamic sample selection from sparse tracking signals

Nicholas Milef, Shinjiro Sueda, Nima Khademi Kalantari

Eurographics (2023)

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Project Page

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Code

Foveated Monte-Carlo Denoising

Nicholas Milef, Nima Khademi Kalantari

SIGGRAPH 2021 Posters (2021)

Poster

Disruptions to shared mental models from poor quality of service in collaborative virtual environments

Nicholas Milef, Di Qi, Adam Ryason, Samuel O. Alfred, Cullen D. Jackson, Suvranu De

Scientific Reports (2021)

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Data

Divided Voxels: an efficient algorithm for interactive cutting of deformable objects

Di Qi, Nicholas Milef, Suvranu De

The Visual Computer (2021)

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Virtual reality operating room with AI guidance: design and validation of a fire scenario

Di Qi, Adam Ryason, Nicholas Milef, Samuel Alfred, Mohamad Rassoul Abu-Nuwar, Mojdeh Kappus, Suvranu De, Daniel B Jones

Surgical Endoscopy (2021)

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Video

Surgeons with five or more actual Cricothyrotomies perform significantly better on a virtual reality simulator

Di Qi, Emil Petrusa, Uwe Kruger, Nicholas Milef, Mohamad Rassoul Abu-Nuwar, Mohamad Haque, Robert Lim, Daniel B Jones, Melih Turkseven, Doga Demirel, Tansel Halic, Suvranu De, Noelle Saillant

Journal of Surgical Research (2020)

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Video

Rendering Surgery Simulation with Vulkan

Nicholas Milef, Di Qi, Suvranu De

GPU Zen 2 (2019)

Book Chapter

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Preprint

Experience

Meta Reality Labs Research - Research Scientist

March 2025 - Present

Meta Reality Labs Research - Research Intern

May 2024 - September 2024

Meta Reality Labs - Software Engineer Intern, Graphics

May 2022 - August 2022

Facebook Reality Labs - Research Engineer Intern, Computational Imaging & Graphics (PhD)

May 2021 - August 2021

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute - Software Engineer

June 2016 - July 2019

Education

Doctor of Philosophy - Texas A&M University

Computer Science

August 2019 - May 2025

Bachelor of Science - University of Virginia

Computer Science

August 2012 - December 2015

Service

Reviewer for SIGGRAPH (2025), ACM Transactions on Graphics (2024), Journal of Robotic Surgery (2023)