School selection with poor gpa however a strong research background for undergrad?

[Calio]

Glad to meet everyone, I am an international undergrad student from Asian and will be graduating in 2024. I wish to pursue the PhD degree further in US or Canada, however, the GPA for the first year of my college is severely affected by the disordered teaching (can't believe we have spend two whole semesters at home because of Covid-19 🥲lol). Around 1.0/4.0 for the first year, I have struggled to make it near 3.1/4.0 this semester... However, since I have been actively enrolled on one of the projects issued by my supervisor, I have published an essay on the Applied Physics Letter (1st author) and another essay on nano research (co-author) this year, which is really a relief to me.

However, I do not know how to arrange my application wisely, is it possible to choose the top 10 university in north America? Or is it wise to only choose the schools around rank 50 (maybe fits my gpa)?

 

Edited June 16, 2023 by Calio
Added details.