Duan is experienced with R, Python, Java, SQL and Tableau. She is also an experienced business intelligence data analysis researcher and has interned at BlueFocus Communication Group and the China National Think Tank on Aging in Beijing, China. She has conducted undergraduate research at Duke through the Center for Advanced Hindsight, the Duke Social Science Research Institute, and the Bass Connections in Energy Project. She also received a research grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to conduct network analysis and text analytics.