Hassan Dawood
Product Manager · Digital Health · Digital Phenotyping

I build and operate the systems that turn passive smartphone and wearable data into research-grade behavioral signal — and I run the same rigor on myself.

I'm a product leader working at the intersection of digital health, clinical research operations, and mobile/backend engineering. I specialize in developing and maintaining the iOS, Android, and cloud infrastructure behind large-scale digital phenotyping studies.

As Head of Platform for the Beiwe Research Platform at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, I lead product management for a mobile research tool used in large-scale behavioral health studies — working directly with clients, researchers, and engineers to ship features, debug across the full stack, and manage the pipeline that turns high-throughput sensor data into meaningful behavioral metrics.

Before this, I worked in healthcare data analytics, building workflows to extract insight from complex financial and clinical datasets. My background spans neuroscience, software, and operations — which is mostly what lets me translate what researchers and clinicians actually need into a real development roadmap.

Outside of work: running, skiing, videography, drones, Legos, wearables — and turning all of the above into personal datasets I actually analyze. Reach out if you're working on something at this intersection.

Personal Projects

Essay · Personal Site Architecture
I Built a Personal Website That Publishes Itself

Most personal sites either go stale after one build or turn every update into a small chore of editing code and redeploying. This one is backed entirely by Notion instead of a CMS dashboard I'd have to learn: adding a project means filling out a database row, and the site reflects what I'm actually working on because updating it is that easy.

Tool · Personal Behavioral Analytics
Instagram Activity Analyzer

I analyze my own personal data as a habit, not because anyone asked, so when Instagram made a full data export available I built a tool to actually look at what was in mine. It's a single self-contained HTML file that reads the export ZIP entirely in the browser: nothing gets uploaded anywhere, and the tool is built to ignore message and comment content outright, extracting only timestamps and anonymized contact IDs.

Essay · Research Funding Automation
I Built a Grant-Finding Tool for My Lab

Part of running operations for the Beiwe Research Platform at Harvard's Onnela Lab is keeping it funded, which used to mean checking Grants.gov, the NIH Guide, and half a dozen foundation sites by hand, hoping I didn't miss a deadline three weeks out. I built a Python scraper that pulls open solicitations from public grant sources and has Claude score each one against the platform's actual research profile.

Essay · Digital Health Research
I Exported My Apple Watch Data Twice. It Didn't Match.

In 2018 I started tracking my own Apple Watch HRV data, just personal curiosity. When I exported the same historical stretch twice, once in 2020 and again in 2021, the numbers didn't match. Nothing about my actual heart rate history had changed, but Apple's algorithm had silently reprocessed it in between.

Essay · Secure Data Engineering
Building a Privacy-First Pipeline for My Own Call and Text History

Beiwe, the research platform I run at work, used to be able to collect call and text metadata directly from a participant's phone, until Apple changed what third-party iOS apps are allowed to see. I got curious whether there was still a way to get at equivalent data some other way, starting purely as a personal project on my own Mac, with every identifier hashed from the very first line of code.

Essay · Personal Productivity
Systems Not Silos — A Productivity Framework

I work at the intersection of academic research, software development, platform operations, technical support, and client account management — which means constant context-switching across very different kinds of work. Managing that manually, keeping it all in my head and improvising responses to recurring situations, was unsustainable. So I built what I think of as a professional operating system: a defined set of inputs, transformation rules, storage locations, and outputs that runs recurring work without me reinventing it every time.

Custom GPT · Product Case Study
JARVIS — Job Analysis & Role Vetting Intel System

Job searches are overwhelming — juggling resumes, tailoring applications, figuring out which roles actually align with a long-term goal. I wanted a tool that could stay organized, give strategic feedback, and support the whole process. So I treated it like launching a real product: built, tested, refined, and iterated on prompts to fix hallucinations — with my sister, who was job-hunting herself, giving real-time feedback on which features actually mattered.

Custom GPT
FRIDAY — Fantasy Research, Data & Analysis for You

Fantasy football is part skill, part luck, and a whole lot of research — juggling analyst sites, injury updates, and endless flex debates. I built a persistent, stateful GPT that acts as a personal GM: it remembers my roster across the season, builds an ideal lineup each week from matchup-based projections, produces sourced player reports (ESPN, FantasyPros, Yahoo, RotoWire, Draft Sharks), evaluates waiver and trade moves with tier-based value, and proactively flags injury news on my own roster with replacement suggestions.

Health Data Studies

Ramadan Eating Patterns & Health Effects
How does fasting during Ramadan affect my physiology and daily behaviors compared to a control period, as measured through wearable and dietary data?
Study details
Design
N-of-1, two matched two-week periods — Ramadan fasting vs. non-Ramadan control
Streams
Dietary timing (MyFitnessPal), CGM (Dexcom Stelo), HR/HRV/steps (Apple Watch Ultra, Oura Gen 3), sleep & readiness (Oura), contextual sensors (Beiwe)
Analysis
paired t-test / WilcoxonCohen's dtime serieslagged correlationmixed effectsCGM AUC
Open questions
Does delayed post-sunset eating affect sleep latency? Do iftar meals cause glucose spikes that shift over the month? Are readiness scores predictive of fasting tolerance?
Apple Watch vs. Oura Ring Comparison
How do summary metrics from the Apple Watch Ultra (Gen 1) and Oura Ring (Gen 3) compare when measured over the same year-long period?
Study details
Design
Observational, ~1 year (May 2024–May 2025), no control period — daily & weekly comparison
Streams
Resting heart rate, HRV, sleep duration, and other overlapping summary metrics from both devices
Analysis
descriptive statsBland-AltmanPearson / Spearmanpaired t-testcross-correlationmixed effects
Open questions
Do the devices agree on directionality of change? Are discrepancies larger during travel, illness, or poor sleep?
Breathing Restriction Device Trial
What is the effect of using a breathing restriction device for 10 minutes a day on physiological and behavioral metrics?
Study details
Design
2-week trial (May 21–Jun 3, 2025) vs. 2-week control period immediately prior
Streams
RHR, HRV, sleep quality, respiratory rate, activity, and timing/duration of breathing sessions (Apple Watch Ultra, Oura Gen 3)
Analysis
descriptive statspaired t-test / Wilcoxontime seriesCohen's dstratified AM/PMmixed effects
Open questions
Does time of day change the effect size? Do longer sessions produce larger improvements? Does any effect persist post-trial?
Sunlight Exposure Effects
How does sunlight exposure affect physiological recovery and readiness — sleep quality, HRV, and Oura readiness score?
Study details
Design
All available historical data, high- vs. low-sunlight days compared retrospectively
Streams
Daily sunlight exposure (GPS/activity + weather APIs), HRV, readiness score, sleep metrics, step count as a confounder check
Analysis
quantile stratificationt-test / Wilcoxonlinear regressionmixed effectstime-lag analysis
Open questions
Does morning sun outperform afternoon? Is the effect seasonal, or nonlinear with diminishing returns?
Screen Time Effects
How does daily screen time impact HRV, sleep quality, and Oura readiness score?
Study details
Design
All available historical data, high- vs. low-screen-time days; travel days excluded
Streams
Daily screen time (iPhone/Watch/third-party logs), HRV, readiness score, sleep metrics, travel indicators
Analysis
quantile stratificationunpaired t-testlinear regressionmixed effectslagged regression
Open questions
Does screen time closer to bedtime hit harder? Are some app categories more disruptive than others? Does high physical activity buffer the effect?