Samuel kou leung Cheung is a research technician at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. On the RIPE project, he focuses on optimizing canopy architecture. He studies the physical characteristics of canopies such as branching, node spacing, and leaf shape, and the ways in which they affect photosynthetic output. Cheung’s contributions to the project include plot maintenance, measuring plant physiological responses, and data collection and processing. He received his bachelor’s degree in molecular and cellular biology at the University of Illinois. Prior to joining RIPE, Cheung worked on accelerating long-read alignment algorithms.