Xiaoru Wen
Civil engineering undergraduate working across historical GIS, digital heritage, cultural landscapes, and spatial visualization.
Xiaoru Wen is an undergraduate student in Civil Engineering at Sichuan Agricultural University. Xiaoru’s current work and interests include historical GIS, digital heritage, cultural landscapes, spatial visualization, and the documentation of built and cultural environments.
Xiaoru has received training in civil engineering, drawing, modelling, and spatial analysis. Recent experience includes a Mitacs GRA research internship at the University of Saskatchewan’s HGIS Lab, as well as independent and team-based projects involving GIS mapping, Minecraft-based digital environments, educational game design, field observation, and visual documentation.
Historical GIS, Extradition Records, and Educational Game Design
From July to September 2026, Xiaoru participated in a Mitacs Globalink Research Award (GRA) placement at the University of Saskatchewan’s HGIS Lab under the supervision of Prof. Benjamin Hoy. The work included processing approximately 6,000 historical case records, revising geographic coordinates, organizing cases into 46 categories, and producing maps with QGIS. Xiaoru also independently developed an educational board game prototype based on historical extradition and cross-border law enforcement in North America.
Exploring Chinese Garden Design Through Minecraft
Completed in August 2025, this independent project explores traditional Chinese garden design through Minecraft. Drawing on Xiaoru’s visits to classical gardens in Suzhou and the garden-making principles discussed in Yuan Ye, the project involved designing a virtual garden with traditional-style buildings, courtyards, water features, rockeries, and planted landscapes. Developed over approximately 1 month, the garden focuses on relationships between architecture, water, vegetation, and viewing spaces. It is an original digital environment rather than a reconstruction of an existing historical garden.
Architectural Field Survey at Bao’en Temple, Pingwu
In January 2025, Xiaoru participated in a 3-day architectural field survey at Bao’en Temple in Pingwu County, Sichuan, organized by the Department of Architecture at Sichuan Agricultural University. Working alongside a team primarily composed of graduate students, Xiaoru assisted with basic fieldwork tasks and documented the historic temple complex through photography. The survey team carried out 3D scanning and produced a point-cloud model of the site. The visit also contributed to Xiaoru’s interest in digital representations of historic architecture and virtual environments.
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