Martin JJ. Bucher

Martin JJ. Bucher


PhD Student at Stanford University

Office: Y2E2 271B


Based in San Francisco, CA


Scholar // GitHub // Twitter // LinkedIn

About

Martin Juan José Bucher is a second-year PhD Student at Stanford University, part of the Gradient Spaces Lab, and advised by Iro Armeni & Leonidas Guibas.

[Summer 2025 Update] — He will be interning as Research Scientist at Autodesk in Boston, MA.

His research interests lie broadly at the intersection of Deep Generative Models, Representation Learning, and Computer Vision — primarily centered on leveraging Generative Models and Structured Scene Representations for a Circular Built Environment. This endeavor is shaping a new frontier that he envisions as Computational Circularity.

Martin holds an MSc in Computer Science from ETH Zurich (2022) and a BSc in Informatics from the University of Zurich (2019). He is also the recipient of the Stanford HAI Graduate Fellowship (2024).

In the past, he has collaborated with Catherine De Wolf at the Circular Engineering for Architecture Lab, with Romana Rust at Gramazio Kohler Research, with Michael Anton Kraus at Design++, and Stefanie Walter and Marco Martini on NLP for Political Economy.

Originally from Chile, he lived in Santiago de Chile for a few years before moving to Switzerland for the last two decades. In addition to research, he is very passionate about specialty coffee, arthouse cinema, mixing music, climbing, and backpacking! He currently lives and works in San Francisco, CA.

Publications

Education

  • Stanford University — USA

    PhD Student

    09/2023 – Present

    Research at the interesection of Deep Generative Modeling, Computer Vision, Representation Learning, Building Information Modeling, and Computational Design.

  • ETH Zurich — Switzerland

    Master of Science (MSc), Computer Science

    2019 – 2022

    Focus on Computer Vision, Deep Learning, Machine Perception, and Deep Generative Modeling.

  • University of Zurich (UZH) — Switzerland

    Bachelor of Science (BSc), Informatics

    2015 – 2019

    Broad curriculum ranging from Software Engineering and Economics over to Physical Geography and Foundational Courses in Computer Science.

Work

  • Research Scientist Intern — Autodesk Inc.

    Autodesk Research, Boston, MA

    06/2025 – 09/2025

    Material Circularity with Machine Learning and Computer Vision

  • Teaching Assistant — Stanford University

    Gradient Spaces Lab

    04/2024 – 06/2024

    Course: CEE 342 — Designing for Gradient Spaces. More information about the course is here

  • Research Assistant — ETH Zurich

    Circular Engineering for Architecture (CEA)

    01/2023 – 09/2023

    Working with the CEA Lab on Large-Scale Spatio-Temporal Reconstruction and Volume Estimation problems using LiDAR data and Photogrammetry methods. Supervised by Prof. Catherine De Wolf

  • Research Assistant — Balgrist University Hospital

    Research in Orthopedic Computer Science (ROCS)

    10/2022 – 12/2022

    Swiss civilian service in the ROCS group. ROCS is involved in various research areas related to the planning and execution of surgical procedures using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Augmented Reality (AR). Supervised by Prof. Philipp Fürnstahl

  • Teaching Assistant — ETH Zurich

    Chair of Innovative and Industrial Construction

    02/2022 – 07/2022

    Course: Introduction to Visual Machine Perception for Architecture, Construction, and Facility Management (ACFM), given at D-BAUG.

  • Research Assistant — UZH

    Chair for International Relations and Political Economy

    02/2021 – 01/2023

    Applied Natural Language Processing (NLP) using Large Language Models (LLMs), Semantic Analysis, Information Retrieval, Transfer Learning, and Representation Learning. My research was part of the DISINTEGRATION project, funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant. Supervised by Prof. Stefanie Walter

  • Software Engineer

    BSI Business Systems Integration AG, Zurich, CH

    09/2017 – 01/2018

    Four month internship as a Software Engineer working mainly with Java EE, PostgreSQL, Spring Boot, and the Eclipse Scout Framework. Further continued to work part-time beside my BSc studies.

  • Co-Founder & Principal Partner

    Tinystudio Bucher & Emmenegger

    2012 — present

    Co-founded Tinystudio, a digital agency for web projects, back in 2012. Still doing some projects with clients in Switzerland from time to time up until today.

Projects

  • rhymegen.xyz — Rhyme Generator

    March 2023

    Small sunday afternoon side project. A web-based client for generating badass rhyming couplets in any language: rhymegen.xyz. Powered by a strong LLM with careful prompt engineering.

  • MSc Thesis at ETH Zurich

    April 2022

    Title: “Performance-Based Generative Design for Parametric Modeling of Engineering Structures Using Deep Conditional Generative Models”. In collaboration with Design++. Advisors: Dr. Michael Anton Kraus, Dr. Romana Rust, Prof. Siyu Tang.

  • Menzha — watchOS App

    February 2020

    An App for watchOS to get the menus from the several cafeterias (i.e. mensas) around campus at ETH Zürich, UZH, and ZHdK right on your wrist. It's called Menzha.

  • BSc Thesis at UZH

    May 2019

    Title: “GENEVIZ: A Visual Tool for the Construction and Blockchain-based Validation of SFC Packages”. Paper (GECON 2019). GitHub Repo.

  • Imhotepic — Multiplayer Board Game

    June 2016

    Imhotep, the Kosmos board game of the year 2016, was implemented as a multiplayer browser game together with five people at UZH. Here is a short Demo from a former recording.

  • Hack Zurich

    2016 / 2017 / 2018

    Participated three times in a row at Hack Zurich, one of Europe's largest hackathons, together with Michael Ziörjen and Pascal Emmenegger. We got into the top 25 teams in 2017 and had the chance to present our iOS prototype, PeakPass, in front of the whole crowd.