Maks Koncilja is a Master’s student at the University of Ljubljana, concurrently enrolled in Master’s programmes in Physics and Financial Mathematics. His research interests include condensed matter physics, stochastic processes, and machine learning. During his studies, he gained experience as a teaching assistant in the course Computer Laboratory and through research work at the Jožef Stefan Institute, where he contributed to a European Space Agency–funded project focused on anomaly detection using machine learning. He completed summer research visits at the theoretical physics departments of CY Paris University, where he was introduced to statistical physics and Monte Carlo methods, and at the Technical University of Dresden, where he worked on problems in dynamical systems.

The ASEF Junior Fellowship provided him with the opportunity to spend ten weeks in California and get a deep dive into research life and the Bay Area startup scene. Joining Professor Uroš Seljak’s cosmology research group showed him the breadth of active research projects and the fast pace of Berkeley academia. During his visit, he started working on gradient-based persistent sampling. His host, Tony Hansen, a retired scientist, businessman, inventor, and a truly kind person, provided him with housing and introduced him to people who made his experience impossible to replicate on his own. He is grateful to Jakob Robnik, Uroš Seljak, and Tony Hansen for making this such a beautiful experience.