# Dr. Cathie So

> Applied AI researcher and founder. Building Helpurr, researching how brains and models represent the world, and training professionals to work with AI. Hong Kong.

Cathie So, PhD, is an AI researcher with a PhD in psychology from the University of Hong Kong. She works across metacognition and decision confidence in brains and language models, large language model evaluation, and verifiable AI. Previously Chief Scientist at a verifiable-machine-learning lab, a ZKML researcher at the Ethereum Foundation's Privacy & Scaling Explorations, and an Honorary Lecturer in psychology at HKU.

## Now

- Helpurr: founder and technical lead of an AI-powered cat wellness app used by more than 4,500 caregivers. https://helpurr.app
- Research: metacognition and decision confidence in brains and language models, LLM evaluation, and verifiable machine learning.
- Teaching: hands-on AI training for professionals.

## Selected Work

- Helpurr App: AI-powered cat wellness and vitals monitoring. https://helpurr.app
- circomlib-ml: open-source Circom circuit library for machine learning. https://github.com/socathie/circomlib-ml
- keras2circom: transpile TensorFlow Keras models into Circom circuits. https://github.com/socathie/keras2circom

## Hackathon Wins

- Judge Judy Agent: AI legal assistant and on-chain arbitration. First place, Safe Agentathon 2025. https://ethglobal.com/showcase/judge-judy-agent-o216m
- ZeroGravity: private weightless neural-network inference. First place, ZK Hack Lisbon 2023. https://devfolio.co/projects/zerogravity-0ea9
- ZKaggle: verifiable decentralized ML bounties. Finalist and sponsor-prize winner, ETHGlobal FVM Space Warp 2023. https://ethglobal.com/showcase/zkaggle-70g3b
- Securian: privacy-focused wallet. Winner, IEEE Hong Kong Web3 Hackathon 2022. https://github.com/socathie/securian

## Publications

- Keung & So (2025). Attitudes towards AI counseling: perceptual fear and perceived chatbot support quality. Frontiers in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1538387
- Webb, Miyoshi, So, Rajananda & Lau (2023). Natural statistics support a rational account of confidence biases. Nature Communications. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-39737-2
- So, Li & Lau (2021). Between-subject correlation of heart rate variability predicts movie preferences. PLOS ONE. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0247625
- Full record: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=kdSVdhIAAAAJ

## Contact

- Email: hi@cathie.so
- For consulting and corporate training: https://ikz.ai
- GitHub: https://github.com/socathie
- LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/cathieso
- X: https://x.com/drcathieso_eth