2-Day Software Carpentry—Python Workshop at Medical Campus 3/20+21
2025-03-20 09:00 - 2025-03-21 16:30 (America/New_York) | Don Soffer Clinical Research Center, 1120 NW 14th St, Miami, FL, 33136, United States
Join us for a free-2-day, in-person only Software Carpentry “Python” Workshop at Medical Campus on Thursday and Friday, March 20 and 21, 2025, at the CTSI Research Training Center (Rooms 710 Q-R). Course Hours both days: 9:00AM – 4:30PM. (Course lasts two days—content is not repeated).
Software Carpentry aims to help researchers get their work done in less time and with less pain by teaching them basic research computing skills. This hands-on 2-day workshop will cover basic concepts and tools, including program design, version control, data management, and task automation. Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems.
Registration Closed—This Session is full
Click here for the Syllabus, which includes: The Code of Conduct, Pre- and Post-Workshop Surveys, a detailed schedule, and the required (free) software with installation instructions.
Who
The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don’t need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.
Where
Rooms 710 R&Q, Miami Clinical and Translational Science Institute, Don Soffer Clinical Research Center, 1120 NW 14th St., Miami, FL 33136. Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.
When
March 20+21, 2025 | 9:00 am – 4:30 pm EST Add to your Google Calendar.
Requirements
Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed (listed here).
Accessibility
We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. The workshop organizers have checked that:

The room is wheelchair / scooter accessible.
Accessible restrooms are available.

We are dedicated to providing a positive and accessible learning environment for all. We do not require participants to provide documentation of disabilities or disclose any unnecessary personal information. However, we do want to help create an inclusive, accessible experience for all participants. We encourage you to share any information that would be helpful to make your Carpentries experience accessible. To request an accommodation for this workshop, please fill out the accommodation request form. If you have questions or need assistance with the accommodation form please email us.
Glosario is a multilingual glossary for computing and data science terms. The glossary helps learners attend workshops and use our lessons to make sense of computational and programming jargon written in English by offering it in their native language. Translating data science terms also provides a teaching tool for Carpentries Instructors to reduce barriers for their learners.
Contact
Please email tnorris@miami.edu for more information.
Sponsored by
Department of Computer Science • Calder Memorial Library • CIMAS
OVPRS • The Graduate School • IDSC • UM Libraries

Instructors

Cameron Riopelle
Director of Research Data & Open Scholarship
University of Miami Libraries
Timothy Norris, PhD
Data Scientist
University of Miami Libraries and
Frost Institute for Data Science
and Computing (IDSC)

Helper(

Cecilia Lopez-Gamundi
PhD Student
University of Miami Rosenstiel School
Marine Geology + Geophysics

Virtual Lecture on Secure 5G Private Networks | Karl Connolly, Esq. 3/20
2025-03-20 11:00 - 12:00 | Zoom (online)
IDSC Director of Population Health Informatics, Dr. Azizi Seixas presents Karl Connolly, Esq., Chief Technology and Marketing Officer for Cellhub | Netmaven. Dr. Connolly’s talk entitled “Secure 5G Private Networks to Enable Multi-Organizational Collaboration” will he held via ZOOM on Thursday, March 20, 2025, 11:00 AM-12:00 PM EST.
This lecture is part of Dr. Seixas’s Future of Data Health Innovation virtual lecture series, and is free and open to the public.
REGISTER NOW

Smart Cities MIAMI 2025 Conference, April 3+4
2025-04-03 09:00 - 18:00 | Lakeside Village, 1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, 33146, United States
Message from the Conference Chair
The University of Miami School of Architecture and Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing presented the 9th annual Smart Cities MIAMI Conference on Thursday and Friday, April 3+4. This year’s conference theme “Equitable Urban Futures” explored data and design innovations for shaping more equitable, human-centric, and agile smart cities.

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Day One was held at the University of Miami Coral Gables campus Lakeside Village Expo Center. A smaller, Day Two Workshop gathered a by-invitation group of external partners for a brainstorming session to create a disciplinary proposal with measurable outcomes.
CONFERENCE Day 1 April 3, 2025 Lakeside Village Expo Center, 1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146 | Exhibits are Day 1 ONLY
WORKSHOP Day 2 April 4, 2025 Newman Alumni Center Tower Room (4th Floor), 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146
Sponsorship Opportunities and limited free Exhibitor Spaces are available. For more information, please call 305/ 243.4962 or email idsc@miami.edu.
Register Now for Day 1 ($50 per person)
Attendance for University of Miami Faculty, Staff, and Students is complimentary. Please email idsc@miami.edu for the PROMO CODE.
Complimentary Parking for Day 1 is available in the Pavia Garage 1st floor Visitor Area | Valid: April 3rd 2025 only, from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM. You will need your License Plate number to register your vehicle. Click here: https://www.offstreet.io/events/ZI71PBLC | Use Registration Code: 10708

Agenda:

[8:30 am-9:00 am]
Registration

[9:00 am-9:10 am]
Introduction and Welcome
Opening Remarks: Dean Rodolphe el-Khoury, PhD
Conference Chair Remarks: Sarbeswar Praharaj, PhD

Session 1: Keynote Presentation

[9:10 am-9:40 am]
Keynote 1:
Jennifer Clark, PhD
Professor and Head, City and Regional Planning
The Ohio State University

[9:40 am-10:10 am]
Keynote 2 :
Nathalie Crutzen, PhD
Founder/Director, HEC Smart City Institute
University of Liège, Belgium

[10:10 am-10:30 am]
Break / Expo Hall

Session 2: Data & Urban Tech for Designing Equitable Smart Cities

[10:30 am-11:30 am]
Session 2 Presentations:
Speaker 1: Fábio Duarte, PhD
Associate Director of Research & Design, MIT Senseable City Lab
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Speaker 2: Anthony Townsend, PhD
Senior Research Associate at Jacbos Urban Tech Hub
Cornell Tech

[11:30 am-12:00 pm]
Panel Discussion:

Raimundo Rodulfo, Director/CIO of Innnovation & Technology, City of Coral Gables
Florence M. Chee, PhD, Associate Professor & Director, Center for Digital Ethics & Policy, School of Communication, Loyola University Chicago
Fábio Duarte, PhD, Associate Director, MIT Senseable City Lab
Anthony Townsend, PhD, Senior Research Associate at Jacobs Urban Tech Hub, Cornell Tech

Moderator: Dean Rodolphe el-Khoury, PhD, University of Miami School of Architecture

[12:00 pm-1:30 pm]
Networking Lunch with Exhibits

Session 3: Innovating Agile and Humane Smart Cities

[1:30 pm-2:30 pm]
Speaker 1: Yan Wang, PhD
Assistant Professor and Director of Urban Agility and Resilience Lab
College of Design, Construction and Planning, University of FloridaSpeaker 2: Eduardo Costa, PhD
Professor of Knowledge Management
Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil

[2:30pm -3:00 pm]
Panel Discussion:

Christina Viala, Sustainability Coordinator, City of Pompano Beach
Masahiko Haraguchi, PhD, Harvard University T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Yan Wang, PhD, Assistant Professor and Director of Urban Agility and Resilience Lab, University of Florida
Eduardo Costa, PhD, Professor of Knowledge Management, Federal University of Santa Catarina

Moderator: Nicholas Tsinoremas, PhD, Director, University of Miami Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing

[3:00 pm-3:15 pm]
Coffee and Networking at Exhibits

[3:15 pm-4:00 pm]
Industry Panel

Jayson Dunn, Sr. Business Manager – State and Local Government, NVIDIA
Fredrik Wannius, Co-Founder and Chief Executive, 1Print
Victor Dover, Founding Principal, Dover, Kohl & Partners Town Planning
Tony Garcia, Co-Founder and Principal, Street Plans
Matthieu Merchadou, Co-Founder & CEO, Magma

Moderator: Anna Queiroz, PhD, Associate Professor, University of Miami School of Communication

[4:00 pm-5:00 pm]
Closing Keynote
Martin de Jong, PhD
Professor and Director of the Dynamics of Inclusive Prosperity Rotterdam School of Management. Erasmus University, Netherlands
Nora Noori, PhD
Digital Transformation Advisor
Erasmus University, Netherlands

[5:00 pm]
Closing Remarks
Conference Chair, Sarbeswar Praharaj, PhD

Featured Speakers

Jennifer Clark, PhD
Professor and Head, City and Regional Planning Section
The Ohio State University

Nathalie Crutzen, PhD
Founder/Director HEC Smart City Institute
University of Liège, Belgium

Martin de Jong, PhD
Professor and Director of the Dynamics of Inclusive Prosperity
Rotterdam School of Management. Erasmus University, Netherlands

Fábio Duarte, PhD
Associate Director of Research & Design, MIT Senseable City Lab
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Anthony Townsend, PhD
Senior Research Associate at the Jacobs Urban Tech Hub
Cornell Tech

Yan Wang, PhD
Assistant Professor and Director of Urban Agility and Resilience Lab
College of Design, Construction and Planning, University of Florida

Eduardo M. Costa, PhD
Professor of Knowledge Management
Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil

Masahiko Haraguchi, PhD
Harvard University T. H. Chan School of Public Health

Dean Rodolphe el-Khoury, PhD
University of Miami School of Architecture

Sarbeswar Praharaj, PhD
Conference Chair
Assistant Professor and Director, Urban Sustainability & Resilience Program, University of Miami

Nick Tsinoremas, PhD
Director, University of Miami Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing

Fredrik Wannius
C0Founder and Chief Executive, 1Print

Florence M. Chee, PhD
Associate Professor & Director, Center for Digital Ethics and Policy, School of Communication, Loyola University Chicago

Victor Dover
Founding Principal, Dover, Kohl, & Partners Town Planning

Jayson Dunn
Sr. Business Manager – State and Local Government, NVIDIA

Tony Garcia
Co-Founder and Principal, Street Plans

Matthieu Merchadou
Co-Founder & CEO, Magma

Nora Noori, PhD
Digital Transformation Advisor
Erasmus University, Netherlands

Anna Carolina Queiroz, PhD
Associate Professor, University of Miami School of Communication

Raimundo Rodulfo
Director/CIO of Innovation & Technology, City of Coral Gables

Christina Viala
Sustainability Coordinator, City of Pompano Beach

Attend the 2024-2025 IDSC Fellows Capstone Event 4/24 in Person or via ZOOM
2025-04-24 15:00 - 17:00 | Richter Library, 1300 Memorial Drive, Coral Gables, Florida, 33146, United States
The Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) invites you to hear the final research project proposal presentations from the 2024-2025 IDSC Fellows. IDSC Fellow is a prestigious designation historically awarded to four graduate or undergraduate students (sophomore level or above) students, but this year we had so many great applicants, we chose six!

Join us to hear Deema Abayawardena, Nimay Mahajan, Cait Martinez, Katarina Micin, Jessica Okutsu, and Alejandra Planells Devesa give us an update on their projects.
The vision of the IDSC Fellows Program is to inspire a new generation of leaders in data science to cross the traditional boundaries between disciplines. IDSC joins with University faculty to mentor the Fellows on how to best utilize the University’s cutting-edge advanced computing resources in their proposed research projects.
Thursday, 4/24/2024, 3:00 – 5:00 PM
IN PERSON:
Richter Library 3rd Floor Conference Room (343)
1300 Memorial Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146 (Map + Directions)
VIA ZOOM:
Zoom link will be included in your registration confirmation.
Register Now (free)
2024-2025 IDSC Fellows

Deema Abayawardena
4th year PhD in Biology
PROJECT: An “omics” approach to unravel the molecular basis for a fundamental polarity in animal eggs
MENTOR:
Zheng Wang, PhD | Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science and Department of Biology
Deema is a fourth-year PhD student in Dr. Athula Wikramanayake’s lab in the Biology Department at the University of Miami. Her research focuses on uncovering the molecular mechanisms that establish polarity in animal oocytes, a process critical for proper embryonic development. By bisecting Patiria miniata (sea star) oocytes, she uses RNA sequencing and mass spectrometry to identify and analyze molecules involved in the localized activation of the evolutionarily conserved Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway. As an IDSC fellow, Deema plans to apply deep learning techniques to analyze RNA-seq and mass spectrometry data to identify differentially enriched factors within the oocytes.

Nimay Mahajan
Junior, BA/BSc in Meteorology + Mathematics
PROJECT: Exploring the Dynamics of a Changing Climate: A Machine Learning Analysis on Indian Monsoon and Atlantic Ocean Interactions under Elevated CO₂ Conditions
Nimay is currently a junior at the University of Miami, double majoring in Meteorology and Mathematics. Under the guidance of Dr. Ben Kirtman, he has been analyzing two datasets from a climate model, one of which simulates doubled atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Using these datasets, his research has focused on examining variability within the Indian Monsoon and its potential impact on vorticity patterns and overall hurricane activity in the East Atlantic through variables such as precipitation. Using the resources at the IDSC, Nimay hopes to apply machine learning techniques to analyze a wide collection of variables and gain insights into their roles and interactions within the Atlantic Ocean.

Cait Martinez
3rd year PhD in Atmospheric Sciences
PROJECT: ENSO Preconditioning versus Noise as the Forecast Evolves: A Machine Learning Diagnosis
MENTOR:
Samuel Goldberg, PhD | Assistant Professor, Department of Marine Geosciences, Rosenstiel School | IDSC Core Faculty Member
Cait is a third-year PhD student in Atmospheric Sciences, advised by Dr. Ben Kirtman at the Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science. Cait’s research aims to disentangle the dual influences of deterministic dynamics and stochastic processes on the predictability of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Prior to joining the Kirtman Group, Cait worked as watershed modeler for Daniel B. Stephens & Associates. She has a M.S. in Hydrologic Science and Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and a B.A. in Geology from the University of Colorado at Boulder. As an IDSC Fellow, Cait’s objective is to develop a machine learning-based diagnostic tool to assess whether subsurface precursors or atmospheric noise play a more dominant role in determining ENSO event outcomes, with the goal of enhancing our understanding of the dynamic drivers of ENSO variability.

Katarina Micin
2nd year PhD in Human Genetics + Genomics
PROJECT: Development of Single-cell RNA Sequencing-Guided Chronic Myelomonocytic Leukemia (CMML) Classification Model
MENTOR:
Vanessa Aguiar-Pulido, PhD | Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, College of Arts & Sciences | P.I., Data Science and Computational Biology Lab
Katarina is a second-year PhD student in the Human Genetics and Genomics program and is a member of Dr. Justin Taylor’s leukemia-focused research laboratory. They graduated from the University of Tennessee with a B.S. in Biology with a concentration in Biochemistry and Cellular and Molecular Biology, and later graduated from the George Washington University with a M.S. in Anatomical and Translational Sciences. As an IDSC fellow, they hope to explore the integration of machine learning algorithms with single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA) technologies in the context of Chronic Myelomonocytic Leukemia (CMML). More specifically, they are interested in the development of a scRNA-guided multinomial CMML classification model with drug response prediction capabilities.

Jessica Okutsu
2nd year PhD in Biology
PROJECT: Therapeutic Potential of Selenium Against Cadmium Toxicity in Zebrafish
ADVISOR: Delia S. Shelton, PhD | Department of Biology
Jessica Okutsu’s research examines how selenium pre-exposure may protect against cadmium-induced toxicity in zebrafish larvae, with a focus on photomotor behavior, mechanosensory behavior, developmental morphology, and cardiovascular function, the latter of which has resulted in a publication in Cardiovascular Toxicology. As an IDSC Fellow, she aims to leverage machine learning techniques to analyze her complex dataset of over 1 million behavioral data points from 1,900+ fish across 18 unique treatment combinations over 4 time points to uncover patterns in selenium-cadmium interactions between multiple datasets. Her work has already demonstrated promising results showing selenium’s protective effects against cadmium-induced malformations. Jessica’s research has implications for understanding potential therapeutic approaches to heavy metal toxicity.

Alejandra Planells Devesa
2nd year PhD in Biochemistry + Molecular Biology
PROJECT: Exploring Peptide-Small Molecule Interactions with AI and Large Language Models for Versatile Molecular Detection and Biosensor Design
MENTOR:
Ravi Vadapalli, PhD | Director, Advanced Computing, Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC)
Alejandra Planells Devesa is a second-year Ph.D. student in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in the Sylvia Daunert Lab at the Miller School of Medicine. She graduated with a B.Sc. in Biotechnology from the high academic program at the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia in Spain and has gained extensive international research experience in labs across Spain, France, and Switzerland. As an IDSC Fellow, Alejandra aims to advance her work on designing adaptable peptide-based biosensors, leveraging machine learning algorithms and large language models (LLMs). Her focus is on developing a streamlined computational pipeline for the rapid identification and optimization of peptide binders with high specificity and affinity, applicable to diverse molecular targets. This approach has the potential to address a broad spectrum of challenges in molecular recognition across biological, clinical, and environmental contexts.

3rd Annual COMPUTING DAY 4/25 Showcases UM's Interdisciplinary Research
2025-04-25 10:00 - 17:00 | Lakeside Village, 1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, 33146, United States
We are pleased to announce the Keynote Speaker of the third annual Computing Day is one of the top ten women in the Robotics Industry also known as “The Robot Whisperer”, Dr. Madeline Gannon of ATONATON. Computing Day showcases the vast array of interdisciplinary research and scholarship in computing at the University of Miami.
Join us at the Lakeside Village Expo Center on Friday, April 25, 2025. Computing Day convenes faculty and student scholars, corporate and government professionals, and other audiences engaged in computing to design the future and foster interdisciplinary collaboration and innovation. This event is free and open to the public.
Keynote Speaker | Madeline Gannon

AtonAton is led by Dr. Madeline Gannon, a multidisciplinary designer and inventor forging new futures for human-robot relations. Dr. Gannon blends techniques in art, design, computer science, and robotics to convince robots to do things they were never intended to do: from transforming giant industrial robots into living, breathing mechanical creatures, to taming hordes of autonomous machines to behave like a pack of animals.
Gannon believes that technology is a cultural medium, and tunes her work to engage communities across science and society. Her work is in the permanent collection of the Copernicus Science Centre, and has been exhibited at international cultural institutions, published at academic conferences, and profiled at global media outlets, such as the BBC, the Guardian, FT, the Science Channel, WIRED, FastCompany, Dezeen, and The Verge.
Gannon has been a Knight Foundation Awardee, a World Economic Forum Cultural Leader, a Robotics & AI Researcher at NVIDIA, and an artist in residence at ETH Zurich, Autodesk Pier 9, and the Carnegie Mellon STUDIO for Creative Inquiry. She is known as one of the ‘Top 10 Women in Robotics Industry‘ and ‘World’s 50 Most Renowned Women in Robotics’ according to Analytics Insight. Gannon holds a M.Arch from Florida International University, and a Ph.D. in Computational Design from Carnegie Mellon University.

Register Now
Friday April 25, 2025 | 10:00 AM-5:00 PM ET
University of Miami Coral Gables campus
Lakeside Village EXPO CENTER
1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146 | (Directions)
Complimentary Parking
Location: Pavia Garage- 1st floor Visitor Area
Date: April 25th 2025
Time: 7:00am -6:00pm
Link: https://www.offstreet.io/events/L5Z3AB7R
Registration Code: 10820
Agenda
9:00 AM Poster + Demo Check-in
10:00 AM Registration Opens | Poster Review Session
10:55 AM Welcome Remarks
11:00 AM Keynote Speaker | Dr. Madeline Ganon, ATONATON
12:00 PM Lunch | Posters + Demos | Networking
2:00 PM Panel Discussion
3:05 PM Closing Remarks
3:15-5:00 PM Posters + Demos | Networking Happy Hour

Call for Posters and Demos!
Faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and staff are invited to submit posters and /or demos for presentation (scroll down for instructions). Submissions are limited to University of Miami only.
Poster Dimensions: 48″ wide x 36″ high (or 36″ wide x 48″ high) maximum. Information on how to design an academic poster (with templates): Click here.
Poster Printing: The event will cover the cost of posters printed in house through the School of Architecture Computing Lab, Building 49. Please email idsc@miami.edu for the billable account number. (The Richter Library Creative Studio large format printer is currently down.)
The submission deadline is Friday, April 18, 2025. If you have any questions and/or require additional information concerning posters or demos, please email idsc@miami.edu.
Before you enter your submission, please make sure that you have the following ready:

Presentation Title
Principal Investigator/Author name(s) and Affiliations
350-word (maximum) Abstract

Poster + Demo Submission Form

Health TechQuity 2025 Addresses Advancements and Social Determinants of Health 4/25
2025-04-25 13:00 - 17:00 | Don Soffer Clinical Research Center, 1120 NW 14th St, Miami, FL, 33136, United States
The University of Miami Miller School of Medicine Department of Informatics and Health Data Science presents Health TechQuity 2025 on Friday, April 25, from 1:00 to 5:00 PM at the Don Soffer Clinical Research Center’s Gordon Center Auditorium (1120 NW 14th Street, Miami, FL 33136).
Hosted by the Media and Innovation Lab (“The MIL”), this year’s event offers an insightful panel discussion on the rapidly evolving FemTech industry, along with dynamic fireside chats featuring expert leaders at the forefront of innovation. Discover how cutting-edge technology is addressing social determinants of health (SDOH) and driving meaningful advancements in health equity.
Register Now

LOCATION
Don Soffer Clinical Research Center
Gordon Center Auditorium
1120 NW 14th St, Miami, FL 33136

Panelists

Brooke Aggarwal, EdD, MS, FAHA
Assistant Professor of Medical Sciences
Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities (CUMU)

Lindsey Calcutt, PhD
Co-Founder + CEO
Incora Health

Layo George, BSN, MHSA
Founder + CEO
Wolomi

Kerstin Recker Alexandre
Co-Founder + CEO
Peli Health

MODERATOR
Mairead Moloney, PhD
Associate Professor Lead
Department of Informatics and Health Data Science
Miller School of Medicine
University of Miami

Fireside Chats

Stacy T. Lindau, MD, MA
Catherine Lindsay Dobson Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Professor of Medicine
University of Chicago

Nicole Cook
Founder + CEO
Alvee

MODERATOR
Azizi Seixas, PhD
Interim Chair
Department of Informatics and Health Data Science
Miller School of Medicine
University of Miami

For more information, contact: TheMIL@miami.edu or call 305-243-8276.

Virtual Lecture on Remote Access Risks | Niam Yaraghi, PhD 5/22
2025-05-22 11:00 - 12:00 | Zoom (online)
IDSC Director of Population Health Informatics, Dr. Azizi Seixas presents Niam Yaraghi, PhD., Associate Professor of Business Technology, Miami Herbert Business School. Dr. Yaraghi’s talk entitled “Remote Access, Real Risks: The Impact of Telehealth Expansion and Rollback on the Opioid Epidemic” will he held via ZOOM on Thursday, May 22, 2025, 11:00 AM-12:00 PM EST. The talk will cover the impact on opioid prescriptions, overdoses, and OUD treatments.
This lecture is part of Dr. Seixas’ Future of Data Health Innovation virtual lecture series, and is free and open to the public.
REGISTER NOW

IDSC Grants Program Call for Proposals INFO SESSION via ZOOM Wednesday 9/10 4PM
2025-09-10 16:00 - 16:30 | Zoom (online)
An INFO SESSION for your questions on the IDSC “Expanding the Use of Collaborative Data Science at UM” Grants Program CALL FOR PROPOSALS will be held on Wednesday, September 10, 2025, at 4:00 PM (:30 minutes) via ZOOM.
The session was recorded and is now online.
This program is designed to increase the use of data science to foster breakthroughs in disciplinary pursuits making the research team more competitive for external funding. Applications are required to include at least one data scientist from the Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) and one researcher from a specific discipline. Typically, the disciplinary researcher initiates and leads the project. The IDSC data scientist acts as a high-level consultant to ensure the proposal has enough data science.
The awards include $20K discretionary funds[1] and 1M Service Units (SUs) to be used for high performance computing (HPC). It is anticipated that five awards will be made.
For the 2025-2026 academic year, IDSC seeks proposals that address the following:

Using data science to improve access to healthcare, and accelerate services and improve healthcare efficiency

Other topics and issues are also welcome. Pre-submission inquiries are encouraged.
In terms of this grant opportunity, data science is defined as utilizing state-of-the-art approaches such as Machine Learning (ML) or Artificial Intelligence (AI) to enable scientific discovery that is data driven. Simply, proposing to analyze large data sets with traditional techniques (e.g., linear regression) is not responsive to this opportunity. Proposals that use AI/ML to develop new understanding are strongly encouraged.
The application process includes two steps:
Step 1: The disciplinary researcher provides a one-page letter of intent to IDSC outlining the discipline specific research and where data science fits in. Based on the letter of intent, the IDSC review team will identify an IDSC data scientist for collaboration, if the research team has not already identified an IDSC partner. Applications are now closed.
Step 2: Upon invitation to advance to Step 2, the research team with assistance from the IDSC data scientist will prepare a two-page proposal that outlines the research and the data science plan. The proposal should also include a short discussion of potential external funding mechanisms that the proposed work can be used to enhance the competitive position of the research team. The application should include an abbreviated one-page biosketch and a budget with justification using the templates included in this announcement. All documents should be combined into a single .pdf.
Eligibility:
This funding opportunity is open to UM Faculty with an active IDSC membership. For more information on IDSC memberships and to apply, visit https://idsc.miami.edu/membership/.
Reporting
The research team is required to submit an interim report midway through the performance period. The one-page report should include a brief description of the project’s progress and an overview of the financial situation. Upon project completion, the research team will submit a one-page final report detailing any accomplishments attributed to the work of this project (publications, proposal submission(s) for extramural funding, data sets generated, etc.) and give an oral presentation describing the research and results as part of IDSC’s seminar series. Scheduling of the oral presentation will be coordinated by IDSC’s Engagement Office.
Review Process
Applications will be reviewed by an evaluation committee to determine feasibility, relevance to IDSC programs and in terms of how the proposed research will put the team in a more competitive position for external funding.
Important Information and Deadlines

Zoom INFO session led by Ben Kirtman: Wednesday, September 10, 2025 at 4: 00 pm (30 minutes) | Please register to receive ZOOM link.
Step 1 – Letters of Intent: Due by 5:00 PM, Tuesday, September 30, 2025.
Invitation to submit full proposal in Step. 2 with identification of an IDSC data scientist partner (if applicable): October 17, 2025.
Step 2 – Two-page proposal: Due by 5:00 PM on Friday, November 21, 2025
Notice of Award: On or before December 19, 2025
Project performance period: January 1, 2026 – December 31, 2026.
Interim Report Due on June 30, 2026
Service Units (SU) expire January 31, 2027
Final Report Due on February 28, 2027
Oral Presentation of Results Due in Fall 2027/Spring 2028

[1] Discretionary funds can be used for salary, travel, and other research-related expenditures as outlined in the proposal budget. Equipment purchases are not allowed.

Dr. Rebecca Shafee of the National Institute of Mental Health | Virtual Lecture 9/18
2025-09-18 11:00 - 12:00 | Zoom (online)
The Future of Health Data Innovation seminar series continues with a virtual lecture by Dr. Rebecca Shafee, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Section on Developmental Neurogenomics, at the National Institute of Mental Health. Talk Topic: “Sex Differences in the Genetic Architecture of the Human Brain Anatomy.”
The Future of Health Data Innovation seminar series explores practical applications of AI and machine learning in healthcare, helping participants evaluate data-driven solutions for improved clinical outcomes and patient access.
At the conclusion of this activity participants will be able to explain the results of Dr. Shafee’s recent work investigating sex differences in the common genetic architecture of brain anatomy in the UK Biobank sample.
The University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians. The University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine designates this live activity for a maximum of 1 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.
The speaker and planning committee indicate no relevant financial disclosures. For additional information please contact Alexander Gonzalez atalex_gonzalez@miami.edu.
Date: Thursday, September 18, 2025
Time: 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Registration link: https://miami.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_uaP2UKTWS0azkcLUgzqZWQ

Virtual AI Lecture Series Exploring Practical Applications—Indraneel Chakraborty 9/26
2025-09-26 14:00 - 16:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. Each session has a separate registration link. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.

September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

October 31 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

November 14 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read a NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

April 10 | Registration Link Forthcoming . . .

April Mann, MD
D I S T I N G U I S H E D S E N I O R L E C T U R E R
and Director of the Writing Center
Department of Writing Studies
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

April Mann, EdD, is Director of the Writing Center and is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Writing Studies. She also provides grant-writing support to the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) at the Miller School of Medicine. April has been facilitating the College of Arts and Sciences’ Summer Writing Institute with her colleague Adina Sanchez-Garcia since 2015. The Institute helps faculty throughout the college reimagine the ways they can use writing in their courses to improve their students’ disciplinary learning. She and her colleagues are in the process of initiating a Writing Enriched Curriculum program to support faculty in other disciplines who want to effectively use writing assignments in their teaching.
For the past two years, she has been co-facilitating a Faculty Working Group for Teaching with AI. This community of practice brings faculty together to discuss their innovative work with AI in the classroom. She also presented at the Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence 2024 Conference. April is co-author of several publications, most recently “The linguistic leap: Understanding, evaluating, and integrating AI in language education.” Journal of Language Teaching, (with colleagues Shai Cohen, Ludovic Mompelat, and Logan Connors). She has several manuscripts currently under contract or under consideration with colleagues in the Writing Studies Department and the School of Education and Human Development. She is also co-author (with colleagues Ava Brillat and Matthew Kaeiser) of “Crossing the Bridge: Writing and Research Bridge Programming for an Intensive English Program” in PILH: Information Literacy and Writing Studies, Volume II – Upper Level and Graduate Studies. Ed. Grace Veach. Purdue University Press, 2019. She is also the author of “Structure and Accommodation: Autism and the Writing Center”, in Autism Spectrum Disorders in the College Composition Classroom: Making Writing Instruction more Accessible for all Students. Eds. Walsh, Lynda and Gerstle, Val. Marquette University Press, 2011. In addition, she was also a contributor to and reader for Composing Inquiry: Methods and Readings for Investigation and Writing. Margaret Marshall, Prentice Hall, 2004.

Virtual AI Lecture Series Exploring Practical Applications—Tom Collins 10/17
2025-10-17 11:00 - 12:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. Each session has a separate registration link. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.
October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

Upcoming Speakers
February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read a NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

April 10 | Registration Link Forthcoming . . .

April Mann, MD
D I S T I N G U I S H E D S E N I O R L E C T U R E R
and Director of the Writing Center
Department of Writing Studies
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

April Mann, EdD, is Director of the Writing Center and is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Writing Studies. She also provides grant-writing support to the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) at the Miller School of Medicine. April has been facilitating the College of Arts and Sciences’ Summer Writing Institute with her colleague Adina Sanchez-Garcia since 2015. The Institute helps faculty throughout the college reimagine the ways they can use writing in their courses to improve their students’ disciplinary learning. She and her colleagues are in the process of initiating a Writing Enriched Curriculum program to support faculty in other disciplines who want to effectively use writing assignments in their teaching.
For the past two years, she has been co-facilitating a Faculty Working Group for Teaching with AI. This community of practice brings faculty together to discuss their innovative work with AI in the classroom. She also presented at the Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence 2024 Conference. April is co-author of several publications, most recently “The linguistic leap: Understanding, evaluating, and integrating AI in language education.” Journal of Language Teaching, (with colleagues Shai Cohen, Ludovic Mompelat, and Logan Connors). She has several manuscripts currently under contract or under consideration with colleagues in the Writing Studies Department and the School of Education and Human Development. She is also co-author (with colleagues Ava Brillat and Matthew Kaeiser) of “Crossing the Bridge: Writing and Research Bridge Programming for an Intensive English Program” in PILH: Information Literacy and Writing Studies, Volume II – Upper Level and Graduate Studies. Ed. Grace Veach. Purdue University Press, 2019. She is also the author of “Structure and Accommodation: Autism and the Writing Center”, in Autism Spectrum Disorders in the College Composition Classroom: Making Writing Instruction more Accessible for all Students. Eds. Walsh, Lynda and Gerstle, Val. Marquette University Press, 2011. In addition, she was also a contributor to and reader for Composing Inquiry: Methods and Readings for Investigation and Writing. Margaret Marshall, Prentice Hall, 2004.

Past Speakers
September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD |
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 31 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

November 14 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

Free 2-Day Scientific Computing Python Workshop 10/23+24 at Rosenstiel
2025-10-23 09:00 - 2025-10-24 16:30 | Rosensteil School of Marine Atmospheric and Earth Science, 4600 Rickenbacker Causeway, Virginia Key, Florida, 33149, United States
The Software Carpentry community (software-carpentry.org) helps researchers get their work done in less time and with less pain by teaching them basic research computing skills. This hands-on “Python” workshop will cover basic concepts and tools, including program design, version control, data management, and task automation.
Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems. The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don’t need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.
Registration Closed (this session is full)
Thursday and Friday, October 23+24 2025, 9:00 AM – 4:30 PM | Course Hours BOTH DAYS | Add to your Google Calendar.
Click here for Full Syllabus + Instructions
Location
Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
Library (Room 106 upper level Science and Administration Building “SLAB”
4600 Rickenbacker Causeway, Virginia Key, FL 33149.
Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.
Requirements
Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed (listed on syllabus).
Accessibility
We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. The workshop organizers have checked that:

The room is wheelchair / scooter accessible (take the elevator located on the ground level in the parking lot area beneath the building).
Accessible restrooms are available.

Parking
Anyone with a UM parking permit associated with their vehicle license plate number can park anywhere inside the gate on the Rosenstiel campus. Parking is first-come, first-served, except for a few spaces tagged “RESERVED.” Outside the gate, the (free) public parking lots are also an option, and alternatively, there is the Rosenstiel Shuttle that originates at the Miller Circle on the Gables campus. (Please check the schedule to see if they are running on the day/time of the event.)
Contact
Please email tnorris@miami.edu for more information.

Instructors

Cameron Riopelle
Director of Research Data & Open Scholarship
University of Miami Libraries

Timothy Norris, PhD
Data Scientist
University of Miami Libraries and
Frost Institute for Data Science
and Computing (IDSC)

Charles Brown-Roberts
Applications Software Developer
University of Miami Libraries

Helpers
Jenna Courtade
Rimpi Khurana
Raquel Quintanilla

Sponsored by
Louis Calder Memorial Library | Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS) | Department of Computer Science | Graduate School | IDSC | Office of the Vice Provost for Research and Scholarship

Virtual AI Lecture Series Exploring Practical Applications—Joseph Johnson 10/31
2025-10-31 14:00 - 16:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. Each session has a separate registration link. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.

October 31 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

Upcoming Speakers
February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read this NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

Past Speakers
September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD |
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

November 14 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

FULL—Free Scientific Computing "R" Workshop 11/4-7 (9AM-1PM daily) at Medical Campus
2025-11-04 09:00 - 2025-11-07 13:00 | Don Soffer Clinical Research Center, 1120 NW 14th St, Miami, FL, 33136, United States
The Software Carpentry community (software-carpentry.org) helps researchers get their work done in less time and with less pain by teaching them basic research computing skills. This hands-on “R” workshop will cover basic concepts and tools, including program design, version control, data management, and task automation.
Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems. The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don’t need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.
Registration is now closed. This session is full.
Tuesday to Friday, November 4-7, 2025, 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM | Course Hours All 4 Days
Workshop is broken into 4 half-day sessions | Add to your Google Calendar.
Click here for Full Syllabus + Instructions
Location
Don Soffer Clinical Research Building (aka “CRB”)
Miami Clinical and Translational Science Institute, Room 710 R+Q
1120 NW 14th Street, 7th Floor, Miami, FL 33136
Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.
Requirements
Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed (listed on syllabus).
Accessibility
We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. The workshop organizers have checked that:

The room is wheelchair / scooter accessible.
Accessible restrooms are available.

Parking
The building has its own parking “14th Street Garage.” Parking is available at a rate of $1.00 per hour, with a maximum charge of $8.00 per day. The building does not validate.
Contact
Please email tnorris@miami.edu for more information.

Instructors

Emory Neer
Research Support Specialist
UM Miller School of Medicine

Erica Newsome
Stem and Interdisciplinary Research Librarian
UM Libraries

Thilani Samarakoon
Biomedical Data Librarian
University of Miami Libraries

Helpers
Rimpi Khurana
Tim Norris

Sponsored by
Louis Calder Memorial Library | Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies (CIMAS) | Department of Computer Science | Graduate School | IDSC | Office of the Vice Provost for Research and Scholarship

VizUM 2025: Critical Cartography Explores Geospatial Visualization 11/10
2025-11-10 16:00 - 19:00 | Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL, 33146, United States
VizUM 2025: Critical Cartography will deconstruct and reconstruct the maps we encounter in our daily lives to seek ways to understand geospatial visualizations as sophisticated storytelling devices that speak to the human experience.
VizUM is a free annual data visualization symposium featuring speakers who are pioneers in the field, whose vision drive products and styles we see around us daily, and who forge new ground in this domain. This event is free and open to the public.
Monday, November 10, 2025 | 4:00-7:00 PM
Register Now (free)
Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146 | Map + Directions
Parking is complimentary. You will need your license plate number. Click on the link below and enter the requested information plus this code: 1110.
Register Your Vehicle • Parking is valid in Gray Zones—Please park head-in only.

Speakers

John B. Krygier
Professor and Chair
Department of Environment
& Sustainability
OHIO WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY

Annette M. Kim
Associate Professor
Price School of Public Policy
Director, Spatial Analysis Lab (SLAB)
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

John Krygier is a geographer with teaching and research specializations in geospatial, cartography, geographic information systems (GIS), and environmental and human geography.
Krygier has extensive research and applied experience. His book Making Maps: A Visual Guide to Map Design for GIS was published in 2005, with the newest edition published in 2024. He writes at makingmaps.substack.com.
Krygier’s research interests include cartography and map design for GIS, critical cartography & GIS, mapping in the arts and humanities, Participatory GIS, the history of mapping, environmental studies, and environmental history. Read his complete CV (PDF).
More information about Krygier’s courses and research can be found on his Ohio Wesleyan web pages.
Annette M. Kim, Ph.D., is Associate Professor at the Sol Price School of Public Policy. She is also the Director of SLAB, the spatial analysis laboratory at USC Price that advances the visualization of the social sciences for public service through teaching, research, and public engagement. She also holds a courtesy appointment at the USC Roski School of Art and Design.
Her research experiments with ways to recover data of overlooked peoples and phenomenon by incorporating fieldwork and humanities knowledge into spatial analysis. She utilizes critical cartography and spatial ethnography to re-conceptualize contemporary urbanism and find more inclusive and humane ways to design and govern the 21st century city. She has also researched the development of real estate markets and the reformation of property rights in transition countries in Eastern Europe and Asia. Her books include Sidewalk City: Re-Mapping Public Space in Ho Chi Minh City (University of Chicago Press, 2015) and Learning to be Capitalists: Entrepreneurs in Vietnam’s Transition Economy (Oxford University Press, 2008), translated into Vietnamese in 2022 by Nha Nam Press.
Previously, Dr. Kim was Associate Professor at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning. She received her Ph.D. in city and regional planning and masters of visual studies from the University of California, Berkeley. She received her masters in public policy and urban planning from Harvard University and her B.A. in architecture and studio art from Wellesley College.

Sponsors
VizUM is sponsored by the Open Visualization Academy, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and the University of Miami School of Communication and Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC).

Virtual AI Lecture Explores Practical Applications—Reynaldo Sanchez 11/14
2025-11-14 14:00 - 16:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. Each session has a separate registration link. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.
November 14 | Video Link forthcoming . . .

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

Upcoming Speakers
February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read this NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

April 10 | Registration Link Forthcoming . . .

April Mann, MD
D I S T I N G U I S H E D S E N I O R L E C T U R E R
and Director of the Writing Center
Department of Writing Studies
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

April Mann, EdD, is Director of the Writing Center and is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Writing Studies. She also provides grant-writing support to the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) at the Miller School of Medicine. April has been facilitating the College of Arts and Sciences’ Summer Writing Institute with her colleague Adina Sanchez-Garcia since 2015. The Institute helps faculty throughout the college reimagine the ways they can use writing in their courses to improve their students’ disciplinary learning. She and her colleagues are in the process of initiating a Writing Enriched Curriculum program to support faculty in other disciplines who want to effectively use writing assignments in their teaching.
For the past two years, she has been co-facilitating a Faculty Working Group for Teaching with AI. This community of practice brings faculty together to discuss their innovative work with AI in the classroom. She also presented at the Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence 2024 Conference. April is co-author of several publications, most recently “The linguistic leap: Understanding, evaluating, and integrating AI in language education.” Journal of Language Teaching, (with colleagues Shai Cohen, Ludovic Mompelat, and Logan Connors). She has several manuscripts currently under contract or under consideration with colleagues in the Writing Studies Department and the School of Education and Human Development. She is also co-author (with colleagues Ava Brillat and Matthew Kaeiser) of “Crossing the Bridge: Writing and Research Bridge Programming for an Intensive English Program” in PILH: Information Literacy and Writing Studies, Volume II – Upper Level and Graduate Studies. Ed. Grace Veach. Purdue University Press, 2019. She is also the author of “Structure and Accommodation: Autism and the Writing Center”, in Autism Spectrum Disorders in the College Composition Classroom: Making Writing Instruction more Accessible for all Students. Eds. Walsh, Lynda and Gerstle, Val. Marquette University Press, 2011. In addition, she was also a contributor to and reader for Composing Inquiry: Methods and Readings for Investigation and Writing. Margaret Marshall, Prentice Hall, 2004.

Past Speakers
September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD |
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

October 31 | Video Link Forthcoming . . .

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

Meet the 2025-2026 IDSC Fellows at the Launch Symposium 12/3 3-5PM
2025-12-03 15:00 - 17:00 | Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL, 33146, United States
The Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) is pleased to announce the IDSC Fellows chosen for the 2025-2026 academic year. Congratulations to graduate students Juliette Casemajor, Samuel Courtney, Ramiro Valdes Jara, Stephanie Kim, Kayla Schwartz, and undergraduate student Isaiah Wang.
This is a prestigious designation awarded to six graduate or undergraduate students (sophomore level or above) students.
The vision of the IDSC Fellows Program is to inspire a new generation of leaders in data science to cross the traditional boundaries between disciplines. IDSC joins with University faculty to mentor the Fellows on how to best utilize the University’s cutting-edge advanced computing resources in their proposed research projects. Read more about the IDSC Fellows program.
Join us on Wednesday, December 3, 2025 from 3:00 to 5:00 PM at the Newman Alumni Center Executive Conference Room for the IDSC Fellows Launch Symposium. Hear the IDSC Fellows present their research project proposals, mingle with faculty and other researchers, and enjoy light refreshments.
Please Register (free) if you plan to attend.
Location
Newman Alumni Center | Executive Conference Room
6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146

2025-2026 IDSC Fellows

Juliette Casemajor
2nd year PhD Student | Marine Biology + Ecology, Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science
Academic Advisor: Gabriel Reygondeau, PhD | Associate Professor, Marine Biology + Ecology, Rosenstiel School
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT: “Integrating species connectivity into global species distribution modeling to improve climate-driven biodiversity forecasts”
Juliette Casemajor’s research investigates how climate change is reshaping the distribution of marine species, with a particular focus on the role of connectivity. Working in the AquaX lab, she combines global species distribution models with ocean based dispersal simulations to distinguish between habitats that are climatically suitable and those that are biologycally accessible. Her work lies at the intersection of marine ecology, physical oceanography and data science, aiming to provide more ecologically accurate forecasts of climate driven range shifts. As an IDSC Fellow, she plans to leverage high performance computing tools to scale her framework to tens of thousands of species, an essentiel step toward producing global-scale biodiversity projections.

Sam Courtney
1st year MS Student | Music Engineering Technology, Frost School of Music
Academic Advisor: Tom Collins
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT: TBA
Sam Courtney is a graduate student in Music Engineering Technology at the University of Miami, working under the mentorship of Dr. Christopher Bennett and Dr. Tom Collins. His research interests span digital signal processing, machine learning, and acoustics. He is a member of the Music Computing & Psychology Lab and a Research Assistant and Software Engineer for the Concerts with Humans and Artificial Intelligence project. As an IDSC Fellow, Sam will investigate direct speech-to-speech translation with a focus on audio and prosodic fidelity, exploring large-scale self-supervised pretraining on raw speech by leveraging high-performance computing resources. His project aims to contribute to more expressive and higher-quality cross-lingual speech and audio technologies.

Ramiro Valdes Jara
2nd Year PhD Student | Industrial + Systems Engineering, College of Engineering
Academic Advisor: Adam Meyers
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT:“A Diffusion-Based Model for Inverse Electrocardiography (ECGI)”
Ramiro is a second-year Ph.D. student in Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Miami’s Intelligent Complex Systems Laboratory (ICS Lab), advised by Dr. Adam Meyers. His research focuses on time-series analysis and generative modeling, with a special focus on diffusion models for imputation, forecasting and solving inverse problems.
Ramiro earned his B.S. in Applied Mathematics and Computing from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid and previously worked on Indexa Capital as a Full-Stack Developer. Additionally, he has collaborated with clinicians and engineers on projects involving hypertensive phenotype analysis and circadian cardiovascular variability.
His broader interests include reinforcement learning, graph neural networks and network science. As an IDSC Fellow, he plans to develop a diffusion generative prior for reconstructing heart-surface electrical activity from Body Surface Potential Mapping (BSPM) and 12-lead ECG. The goal is to deliver accurate epicardial potential maps with calibrated uncertainty, improving robustness to noise and anatomical variability.
Personal Website for reference: https://ramirovaldesjara.github.io

Stephanie Kim
2nd year PhD Student | Human Genomics + Genetics, Miller School of Medicine
Academic Advisors: Justin Taylor and Vanessa Aguiar-Pulido
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT: “Decoding the Intronic Signature of Cancer: Linking Intron Subtypes, Splicing Dysregulation and Tumor Biology”
Stephanie S. Kim is a second-year Ph.D. student in Human Genetics and Genomics at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, under the guidance of Dr. Justin Taylor and Dr. Vanessa Aguiar-Pulido. Her research focuses on developing AI-driven models to decode the dark genome with an emphasis on intronic sub-classifications and splicing vulnerabilities that contribute to tumor development and progression. Stephanie earned her M.S. in Biostatistics from the University of Southern California and her B.S. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and prior to joining the University of Miami, she worked on the identification of methylation biomarkers, Gastric cancer genomics, and modeling of homologous recombination deficiency at the Precision Medicine Center of Seoul National University Bundang Hospital. Her broader interests include leveraging computational genomics, deep learning, and large-scale sequencing to advance precise and equitable cancer diagnostics and therapeutics.

Kayla Schwartz
GR3 (Year 5) | MD Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) + Cancer Biology (CAB) PhD Student
Academic Advisor: Oliver McDonald
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT: TBA
Kayla Schwartz is a fifth-year MD-PhD candidate in the University of Miami’s Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP). Her research focuses on the tumor microenvironment of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), with an emphasis on understanding how primary and metastatic PDAC differ at the molecular and cellular levels. She integrates molecular biology, single-cell genomics, and computational approaches to uncover mechanisms that drive metastatic progression. Kayla aims to leverage her dual training as a physician-scientist to advance data-driven strategies that improve outcomes for future oncology patients.

Isaiah Wang
4th Year Undergraduate Student, BS | Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science
Academic Advisor: Mohamed Iskandarani | Project P.I. Mariana Bif
IDSC Mentor: TBA
PROJECT: TBA
Isaiah Wang is an undergraduate student at the University of Miami majoring in Computer Science and Marine Science, with minors in Mechanical Engineering, Mathematics, and Marine Policy. Through a broad range of interdisciplinary research experiences—spanning bioinformatic machine learning, remote sensing, and oceanographic carbon-flux analysis—he has developed a strong interest in applying computational and engineering tools to better understand and explore the ocean. After graduation, he plans to pursue graduate studies in ocean engineering, focusing on autonomous underwater vehicles, marine sensing, and intelligent exploration technologies.

Future of Health Data Innovation Lecture by Dr. Rachele Hendricks-Sturrup 12/4
2025-12-04 11:00 - 12:00 | Zoom (online)
The Future of Health Data Innovation virtual seminar series continues with a lecture by Dr. Rachele Hendricks-Sturrup. Dr. Hendricks-Sturrup is Research Director of Real-World Evidence at the Duke-Margolis Institute for Health Policy, where she leads work at the intersection of health policy, innovation, and ethics.
TALK TITLE “A Privacy-Centric and Federated Approach to Machine Learning for the Collection and Sharing of Patient-Reported Outcomes Data in Genomic Medicine Research”
Thursday December 4th, 2025 | 11:00 AM-12:oo PM • CME and Accreditation Details
Register Now
The Future of Health Data Innovation seminar series explores practical applications of AI and machine learning in healthcare, helping participants evaluate data-driven solutions for improved clinical outcomes and patient access. For additional information please contact Alexander Gonzalez at alex_gonzalez@miami.edu.

Computation + Journalism Symposium 2025 12/11+12
2025-12-11 09:00 - 2025-12-12 16:00 | Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL, 33146, United States
Authoritarian movements are on the rise worldwide. This has led to the degradation or outright destruction of trustworthy data, and to increasingly hostile environments where attacks on knowledge-creation and -dissemination professions and institutions—journalism and academia included—are becoming everyday news. The Computation + Journalism Symposium (C+J) will cast light on this challenge, aiming to become a forum to discuss how to face it. Join us for two days of talks, workshops, roundtable sessions, and paper presentations.
Thursday and Friday, December 11+ 12, 2025
Day 1 9:00AM-6:30PM (Registration Opens at 8:00 AM, Closing Reception Begins at 6:30 PM)
Day 2 9:00AM-4:00 PM (Registration Opens at 8:00 AM,Event ends at 4:00)
$150 per person | $30 Students • TICKETS include BOTH DAYS, Complimentary Parking, Breakfast and Lunch both days, and a Networking Reception Day One
Keynote Speakers

Attila Bátorfy | Eötvös Loránd University
Attila Bátorfy is a data journalist, media scholar, and professor of journalism and information design at the Department of Media and Communication Studies at Eötvös Loránd University Budapest. Before his academic career, he worked as a journalist for nearly fifteen years. He was previously the head of data at Átlátszó, Hungary’s first investigative journalism outlet. In 2018 he founded with Átlátszó the visual journalism project Átló. He has received numerous awards for his journalistic work. He has published several articles on the authoritarian tendencies and transformation of the Hungarian media system and journalism over the past decade.

Master Instructor, ELTE Faculty of Humanities | Lecturer: Institute for the Theory of Art and Media Studies | Lecturer: Department of Media and Communication
MTMT / Google Scholar
attilabatorfy.com • Facebook • Linkedin • BlueSky
Latest publication: The Hungarian Media System: Unequal Worlds
Book: Adatvizualizáció. Bevezetés az adatok grafikus ábrázolásának elméletébe és módszerébe.

Talk Title: Data journalism in an illiberal regime
Abstract: Two decades ago, most evangelists of data journalism proclaimed that an age of facts and reason was coming. We have many reasons to believe that the opposite has happened. While data journalism methods have become increasingly sophisticated and more data has become available, the impact of this type of content has been limited. This is especially true in a country, Hungary, that has had an authoritarian government for a decade and a half. What has worked so far, what has not worked, and what will never work in data journalism in an illiberal country?

Yevheniia Drozdova | Texty.org.ua (Kyiv, Ukraine)
Yevhenii Drozdova holds a Master’s degree in Media and Communications and began her career in a local newspaper. In 2017, she joined the independent Ukrainian media outlet Texty.org.ua, where she now leads the Data Journalism Section. She is passionate about anthropological stories and often works with satellite imagery to explore social and geopolitical issues.
Since 2023, Yevheniia has served as a jury member for The Sigma Awards, an international data journalism competition. She also enjoys creating interactive data stories that make complex issues accessible to wider audiences.
Talk Title: Guiding Through the Fog: Media’s Role in Narrative Wars
Abstract: In today’s complex information landscape, simply debunking individual fakes is no longer sufficient. Readers need a compass — an approach that helps them navigate competing narratives and understand the intentions behind them.
Texty.org.ua embodies this approach as an independent Ukrainian data journalism outlet. Since 2014, the team has focused on studying disinformation and manipulation in the information space, combining traditional journalism with machine learning and natural language processing. Even before AI became mainstream, Texty was already using these technologies to create large-scale interactive projects that make complex topics accessible to broad audiences.
What challenges arise when preparing such investigations, and is the audience ready to engage and understand them? These are some of the questions we will address.
Texty’s work has earned international recognition, including The Sigma Awards along with multiple European and Ukrainian journalism honors. In 2025, Texty won a Sigma Award for a project that examined manipulations in Telegram channels popular in Ukraine.

Homa Hosseinmardi, PhD | UCLA
Homa Hosseinmardi is an Assistant Professor of Data Science (DataX) and Computational Communication at UCLA, where she directs the OASIS Lab (Online and AI Systems’ Integrity & Safety). Her research takes a holistic, large-scale approach to understanding sociotechnical systems and information ecosystems, with a focus on safety and trustworthiness.She serves as an editor for the Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media, received the “Outstanding Research Award” during her Ph.D., and co-founded the CyberSafety workshop series. Her work has been featured in major media outlets and published in over 30 peer-reviewed papers, including top venues such as PNAS, Science Advances, TKDE, and IMWUT.
Talk Title: Overexamined Algorithms and Overlooked Agency: Rethinking Online Harm
Abstract: In recent years, critics of online platforms have raised concerns about the ability of recommendation algorithms to amplify problematic content with potentially radicalizing consequences. Yet most attempts to evaluate these claims suffer from a core methodological gap: the absence of appropriate counterfactuals—what users would have encountered without algorithmic recommendations—making it difficult to disentangle the influence of the algorithm from users’ own intentions.
To address this challenge, we first examined the scale of the problem and possible explanations. While we identified several distinct communities of news consumers within YouTube, from moderate to more extreme, we found little evidence that the YouTube recommendation algorithm is actively driving attention to problematic content. Overall, our findings indicate that trends in video-based political news consumption are determined by a complicated combination of user preferences, platform features such as recommendation systems, as well as the supply-and-demand dynamics of the broader web.
We propose a novel method called “counterfactual bots,” which enables us to disentangle the role of the user from platform features on the consumption of highly partisan content. By comparing bots that replicate real users’ consumption patterns with counterfactual bots that follow rule-based trajectories, we show that, on average, relying exclusively on the recommender results in less partisan consumption, with the effect being most pronounced for heavy partisan consumers.

Kae Petrin Data & Graphics Reporter, Civic News Company
Kae Petrin is a data journalist and media educator whose work crosses the intersections of government accountability reporting and LGBTQ+ communities coverage. They are a current John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University.
In 2020, they cofounded the Trans Journalists Association with several dozen fellow journalists. Through four years of volunteer work as a board member and Interim Executive Director, they oversaw the organization’s formalization into a 501(c)(3). Kae now serves on the board as President.
As a Data & Graphics Reporter on Civic News Company’s visuals team, they collaborate with local reporters to tell policy and accountability stories about education, voting rights, and public health. Throughout their career in local news they have contributed analysis and visualizations to reporting recognized by regional and national awards. They also served on the board of directors for the St. Louis Pro chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists from 2017 to 2023.
Kae presents on queer and trans coverage best practices, data reporting and visualization tools, and the collision of these topics for universities, industry conferences, and newsrooms around the U.S.
Talk Title: Malice & government data: What anti-LGBTQ+ policies mean for journalism
Abstract: The Trump administration has gone out of its way to obstruct and remove data collections related to LGBTQ+ Americans. In his first term, this looked like interference with the 2020 Census. Now, it involves mass-censoring the word “gender” to “sex” in scientific datasets and removing some of the few repositories of federal data that we have on LGBTQ+ people. The latter sets back years of research and changes to data collection practices that could have informed policy change. Yet, LGBTQ+ data collection has a dark side: Texas, for instance, has attempted to use data as a tool of state power, to separate families from transgender children and to identify Texans seeking out-of-state medical care. How can journalists work with datasets that might seek to actively misrepresent their content? And how can we responsibly illuminate data that may fill in the absences the government is creating?

Speakers

Alberto Cairo, PhD | UM School of Communication
At the University of Miami, Dr. Cairo is the Knight Chair in Visual Journalism and a Professor in the Department of Journalism and Media Management teaching classes on visualization and information graphics, and for the Master of Fine Arts in Interactive Media program. In addition, he is the Director of Visualization at The U’s Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC). He holds a BA in Journalism from the Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, and MA and PhD degrees from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya in Spain. Dr. Cairo has also been a lecturer and professor at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M), Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Described in a Microsoft profile as always in the vanguard of visual journalism, Cairo’s career has tracked alongside the major technological developments in and out of the newsroom. He served as the Director of Infographics of El Mundo online (Spain, 2000-2005) and Editora Globo (Brazil, 2010-2011), and has consulted with—and organized workshops and other training programs for—media organizations and educational institutions in more than 30 countries. He works as a consultant for organizations such as Google News Initiative, NORC at the University of Chicago, the European Commission, and the Congressional Budget Office.
Cairo is a host at The Data Journalism podcast with Simon Rogers and Scott Klein, and the author of four books:

The Art of Insight: How Great Visualization Designers Think (2023)
How Charts Lie: Getting Smarter About Visual Information (2019)
The Truthful Art: Data, Charts, and Maps for Communication (2016), and
The Functional Art: an Introduction to Information Graphics and Visualization (2012).

This year, Cairo is launching the Open Visualization Academy, an open source repository of knowledge about information design and data visualization.

Meg Heckman | Northeastern University
Meg Heckman is an associate professor at Northeastern University in Boston where she explores journalism’s past, present and future. She uses a mix of computational and analog methods to uncover hidden media history narratives and revitalize local news.
Her scholarly work has been published in Journalism Practice, Journalism Studies and the Newspaper Research Journal. She also writes regularly for a variety of general interest and industry publications including WBUR Cognoscenti, Politico Magazine, USA Today, Saturday Evening Post, Poynter, Columbia Journalism Review and Nieman Lab.
Talk Title: AI in local newsrooms
Abstract: Local newsrooms are small, complex organizations that play a vital role in democracy. They are also often at the mercy of Big Tech, struggling to adapt their tools, their workflows and their audiences’ expectations to a relentless parade of technological changes. Just as local news publishers were beginning to find their footing in the digital information ecosystem, they were faced with a new technological revolution: Generative AI. This talk will consider GenAI as the latest in a long line of media innovations that have rocked local news organizations and ponder how its proliferation will impact their ability to foster civic life.

Duy Nguyen | The New York Times
Duy Nguyen is a senior machine-learning engineer on the A.I. Initiatives team at The New York Times. This is Duy’s second tour at The Times, having worked in Opinion Graphics as part of the 2021-22 fellowship class. Since then, he’s been a data scientist at the Brown Institute’s Local News Lab at Columbia Journalism School, helping local newsrooms use A.I. to solve business and audience problems.
In 2021, he was the lead developer of Gumshoe, an A.I. document ranking tool that is now a widely used DocumentCloud extension.
*(sounds like zwi win)
Talk Title: AI at The New York Times
Abstract: One of our mandates at The New York Times’s A.I. Initiatives team is to prototype tools that assist Times journalists in all parts of the reporting process. To that end, my specialty is in three areas:
For newsgathering, it’s media monitoring – tracking, transcribing and summarizing what politicians and prominent figures are saying at scale;
For writing and production, it’s helping reporters generate first drafts of alt texts, SEO headlines, bullet summaries from articles so they can focus on the original reporting;
For publishing, it’s quality control of this A.I.-generated copy. The Times does not publish A.I.-generated copy, so it’s crucial that we build tools that help editors review large amounts of A.I.-generated first drafts and make sure they meet our standards

Location
UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI | Coral Gables campus Newman Alumni Center, Multipurpose Room 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146 Map + Directions | Complimentary Parking Info TBA
Symposium Supporters
C+J 2025 is supported by The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and by the University of Miami Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) and School of Communication.
Sponsorship Opportunities | Download FLYER
C+J sponsorships give your company or organization a visible presence with over 250 journalists, data storytellers, social scientists, artists, digital humanities scholars, cartographers, and others working at the intersection of computation and journalism. For more information, call us at 305.243.4962, or email idsc@miami.edu.
Keynote Sponsor $15,000

Recognition as Keynote Sponsor in all collateral, electronic communications, and signage including save the date announcement, invitation, program, and pre- and post-event event news articles generated by the University of Miami
Prominent Sponsorship recognition on symposium website with click through link
Recognition as Sponsor in conference opening remarks
Prominent recognition on symposium signage at event
Recognition on your name badge(s) as Keynote Sponsor

Reception Sponsor $10,000

Recognition as Reception Sponsor in all collateral, electronic communications, and signage including save the date announcement, invitation, program, and pre- and post-event event news articles generated by the University of Miami
Prominent Sponsorship recognition on symposium website with click through link
Recognition as Sponsor in conference opening remarks
Prominent recognition on symposium signage at event
Recognition on your name badge(s) as Reception Sponsor

Workshop Sponsor $5,000

Recognition as Contributed Workshop/Session Sponsor on symposium website.
Recognition on symposium signage at event
Recognition on your name badge(s) as Workshop Sponsor

Travel Sponsor $3,000

Help 4 people to attend who would not otherwise be able to do so.
Recognition on your name badge(s) as Travel Sponsor

For more information, call us at 305.243.4962, or email idsc@miami.edu.
Conference Leadership

Alberto Cairo, PhD | Chair (University of Miami)
Rahul Bhargava | Committee Member (Northeastern University)
Nicholas Diakopoulos | Committee Member (Northwestern University)
Evelyn Cruz | Director, Business Operations, Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (University of Miami IDSC)
Jacqueline Green-Allen | Senior Administrative Assistant (University of Miami IDSC)
Helen Gynell | Graphic Designer (University of Miami IDSC)

If you need more info. or for general inquiries about the C+J 2025, contact the Chair, Prof. Alberto Cairo a.cairo@miami.edu

Call for Posters and Demos for IDSC DAY 2026 1/22
2026-01-22 10:00 - 17:00 | Lakeside Village, 1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, 33146, United States
The Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) cordially invites you to the 3rd annual IDSC Day on Thursday, January 22, 2026, at the University of Miami Lakeside Village EXPO CENTER. Demos, posters, and presentations will showcase the impact IDSC has made on the University of Miami, South Florida community, and beyond.

Register Now | Call for Poster and Demo Submissions
Thursday 1/22 | 10:00 AM-5:00 PM
(includes Complimentary Parking, Lunch, and Networking Reception)
This exciting event convenes faculty, staff, students, and industry partners to enable discovery through leading-edge scientific and computational projects that extract hidden knowledge and generate fresh insights from large and complex datasets. At IDSC Day, you can meet our core faculty members and current IDSC Fellows, and discuss their projects, studies, and research interests. There will be demos, posters, and presentations from grant recipients who will discuss how IDSC support has made them more competitive for Federal funding. Toward the end of the day, we will host a relaxed social event, providing opportunities for conversations, learning, and networking.
IDSC is pleased to announce the keynote speakers for the third annual IDSC Day: Ishrat Badami and Rocio Joo
Keynote Speaker | Ishrat Badami, MS

TALK TITLE: Beyond Automation: Shaping Ethical Destiny from Gutenberg to Generative AI
Ms. Ishrat Badami is a technologist and researcher with over 12 years of experience in applied AI research and product development across multiple domains, including robotics, healthcare, visual effects, advertising, and education technology.
She holds a master’s degree in computer vision and machine learning from the University of Bonn, Germany.
She began her journey working on mobile assistive robotics under a European Union research initiative, followed by developing AI systems for elderly care and fall detection. Ishrat later contributed to the evolution of AI-powered visual effects pipelines and spent several years advancing contextual and creative intelligence in ad tech.
She is now focused on building next-generation learning experiences in education technology at a stealth startup. Passionate about bridging research and real-world applications, Ishrat continues to explore how multimodal AI can reshape storytelling, learning, and human–machine collaboration. Read More
Keynote Speaker | Rocío Joo, PhD

TALK TITLE: TBA
Rocío Joo is a senior data scientist on the research and innovation team at Global Fishing Watch. She oversees the development and improvement of the organization’s fishing and vessel behavioral models, while also leading research efforts on forced labor and helping coordinate research partnerships, particularly in Latin America.
Prior to joining Global Fishing Watch, Joo worked at Instituto del Mar del Perú, Institut Français de Recherche pour l’Exploitation de la Mer, France, and the University of Florida in the U.S., conducting fisheries and movement ecology research.
Joo obtained her bachelor’s degree in statistics engineering at Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería in Peru, a master’s degree in biostatistics and her doctorate in ecosystems at Université de Montpellier, France.

Location
University of Miami
Lakeside Village EXPO CENTER (Map + Directions)
1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146
Where to Park
Complimentary Reserved Parking is available in the Pavia Garage (see map below) right next to the Lakeside Village (1280 Stanford Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146). Enter on Pavia Street and tell the attendant you’re here for IDSC Day. You must register your vehicle online. Link Forthcoming. You will need to enter your License Plate Number and State, click NEXT. Enter your Name, click Next, then enter this Code: (pending), and click PARK.
Parking is valid during the hours of TBA a.m. –TBA p.m. only on Thursday, January 22, 2026. NOTE: Please park head in only.

Agenda

9:00 AM
Registration Opens | Light Refreshments

10:00 AM
Welcome Address | Nick Tsinoremas, PhD

10:15 AM
KEYNOTE | Ishrat Badami, MS

11:00 AM
Lightning Talks

12:00 PM
LUNCH | Posters + Demos

1:30 PM
KEYNOTE | Rocio Joo, PhD

2:15 PM
Generative AI PANEL | Kaan Inal, PhD, Moderator

3:00 PM
Introducing New IDSC Joint Faculty

3:30 PM
Closing Remarks

3:35-5:30 PM
NETWORKING RECEPTION | Posters + Demos

Call for Poster and Demo Submissions!
We are excited to invite UM faculty, researchers, students, and our Grants Program Collaborative Data Science awardees to submit posters and demos for IDSC Day 2026. The success of this event truly relies on your participation—your innovative research, creative projects, and cutting-edge work are what will make IDSC Day impactful.
Submission Guidelines

Posters: Share your research, discoveries, or projects through an engaging visual presentation. Max dimensions: 48″’ wide x 36” high or 36″ wide x 48″ high.
Demos: Showcase your interactive or experimental work with live demonstrations.
Submission Deadline: Thursday, January 15, 2026 by midnight
Please Note: IDSC will cover the cost of posters printed in house through the Richter Library Creative Studio. Please email idsc@miami.edu for the account number to give to the Creative Studio attendant.

Submission Form
For additional information, please email idsc@miami.edu or call 305-243-4962.

Join us for an INTRO to IDSC Advanced Computing Systems + Services 1/26 1PM via ZOOM
2026-01-26 13:00 - 14:00 | Zoom (online)
The Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (aka “IDSC” eye-disk) Advanced Computing Systems platform (“ACS”) is hosting an Advanced Computing User Training Session on Monday, January 26, 1:00-2:00 PM via ZOOM. This session is free and open to the public.
This is a light training for newer users of the clusters, or for anyone interested in what IDSC ACS has to offer.
Topics include:

Connecting to the Cluster
How to securely access Triton & Pegasus using SSH and supported login methods.

Transferring Data
Methods for uploading and downloading data between your local system and the cluster.

Navigating the Filesystem
Understanding directory structure and common Linux commands.

Storage
Overview of available storage options and quotas.

Software (Environment/Modules)
Using modules to load and manage software and libraries.

Processing Jobs (LSF)
Submitting, monitoring, and managing batch jobs using the LSF (Load Sharing Facility) scheduler, a powerful workload management platform and job scheduler for HPC environments.

Queues
Explanation of available job queues, their limits, and how to choose the right one.

ACS Landing Page
Central hub for ACS documentation, resources, and support links.

Intro to the IDSC Chatbot: “LeBrain Jones”
An AI assistant that provides quick answers and guidance for IDSC users.

Please REGISTER
The ZOOM link will be emailed to you upon completion of registration. If you have any questions, please contact us at idsc@miami.edu or 305-243-4962.

﻿

Mathematics and Machine Learning for Earth System Simulation 2/2-6/2026
2026-02-02 00:00 - 2026-02-06 23:59 | IPAM at UCLA, 460 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, United States
Modern scientific progress is often driven by numerical computations and simulations to represent large numbers of complex and interrelated physical processes. In recent years, machine learning (ML) applications in earth system simulation and prediction have promised to accelerate the accuracy and computational processing power of Earth system models including physics-constrained approaches, super ultra-high resolution, large language models for earth systems, and uncertainty quantification.

“Mathematics and Machine Learning for Earth System Simulation” is a week-long workshop that will bring together experts from diverse fields related to earth system simulation (e.g. computer science, mathematics, atmospheric science, earth system science, etc.) to explore the intersection of mathematics, traditional numerical methods, data assimilation, and cutting-edge machine learning techniques.
Topics that will be discussed include:

Integration of Numerical and Data-Driven Algorithms
Mathematical Operators and Inference
Scale Agnostic Forecasting
Foundation Models for Downstream Tasks

The workshop is hosted by the Institute for Pure & Applied Mathematics (IPAM), an NSF Math Institute. The workshop takes place Monday-Friday, February 2-6, 2026, at IPAM on the UCLA campus: 460 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, California, 90095.
Early Registration Rates
Faculty $75
Government/Military Participant $75
Graduate Student $25
Industry $100
Postdoc $50
Register Now
PLEASE NOTE: Registration fees must be received two weeks in advance of the first day of the workshop to qualify for the early registration fees listed above. After that date, registration fees increase by $10, except for remote participants. There are no refunds of registration fees, barring extenuating circumstances.
Speakers
The current speaker line-up includes:

Tapio Schneider (California Institute of Technology)
Pierre Gentine (Columbia University)
Michael Ghil (UCLA)
Pedram Hassanzadeh (University of Chicago)
David John Gagne (NCAR)
Katherine Breen (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)
Dimitrios Giannakis (Dartmouth College)
Po-Lun Ma (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)
Jill Johnson (University of Sheffield, UK)
Tom Beucler (University of Lausanne, Switzerland)
Gary Froyland (University of New South Wales, Australia)
Johan Mathé (Atmo AI)
Damian Rouson (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory)

As well as speakers from the University of Miami:

Mohamed Iskandarani (Department of Ocean Sciences)
Michael Fischer (Department of Ocean Sciences & IDSC Core Faculty)
Milan Curcic, Workshop Co-Organizer (Department of Ocean Sciences & IDSC Core Faculty)

Workshop organizers expect that it will result in a review/perspective paper on the state of the field and the imminent obstacles. Please apply for support and/or register if you’d like to attend.
Financial Support
Those requesting financial support to attend the workshop should apply early. Applications received by Friday, October 31, 2025 will receive fullest consideration. Questions and supporting documents should be sent to the email below. Successful applicants will be notified as soon as funding decisions are made. If you do not need or want to apply for funding, you may simply register. IPAM will close registration if they reach capacity; for this reason, they encourage you to register early.
Funding is available especially to support the attendance of recent PhDs, graduate students, and researchers in the early stages of their career; however, mathematicians and scientists at all levels who are interested in this area are encouraged to apply for funding. Encouraging the careers of women and minority mathematicians and scientists is an important component of IPAM’s mission and they welcome those applications.
Please send your questions and supporting documents to: wcs2026@ipam.ucla.edu
The deadline to apply is Friday, October 31, 2025.
Apply Here
______
Organizing Committee
Katherine Breen, Chair (NASA)
Donifan Barahona (NASA)
Nico Caltabiano (University of Southampton)
Milan Curcic (University of Miami)
Adam Rupe (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)
Marcus van Lier-Walqui (Columbia University)

Miami XR 2026: Where Innovation Meets Imagination 2/12+13
2026-02-12 00:00 - 2026-02-13 23:59 | Shalala Student Center Complex, 1330 Miller Drive, Coral Gables, Florida, 33146, United States
Miami XR is back! Join us in Miami for two unforgettable days of discovery, connection, and creativity. Reconnect with the XR community while exploring groundbreaking research, inspiring talks, hands-on demos, interactive session, keynote speakers, and lively after-hours events.
Get ready for fresh ideas, new collaboration, and experiences that will spark creativity, shape careers, and change the future of immersive media.

Visit the website for more information.

Virtual AI Lecture Series Exploring Practical Applications—Andres Sawicki 2/20
2026-02-20 14:00 - 16:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. Each session has a separate registration link. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.
February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read this NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

April 10 | Registration Link Forthcoming . . .

April Mann, MD
D I S T I N G U I S H E D S E N I O R L E C T U R E R
and Director of the Writing Center
Department of Writing Studies
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

April Mann, EdD, is Director of the Writing Center and is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Writing Studies. She also provides grant-writing support to the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) at the Miller School of Medicine. April has been facilitating the College of Arts and Sciences’ Summer Writing Institute with her colleague Adina Sanchez-Garcia since 2015. The Institute helps faculty throughout the college reimagine the ways they can use writing in their courses to improve their students’ disciplinary learning. She and her colleagues are in the process of initiating a Writing Enriched Curriculum program to support faculty in other disciplines who want to effectively use writing assignments in their teaching.
For the past two years, she has been co-facilitating a Faculty Working Group for Teaching with AI. This community of practice brings faculty together to discuss their innovative work with AI in the classroom. She also presented at the Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence 2024 Conference. April is co-author of several publications, most recently “The linguistic leap: Understanding, evaluating, and integrating AI in language education.” Journal of Language Teaching, (with colleagues Shai Cohen, Ludovic Mompelat, and Logan Connors). She has several manuscripts currently under contract or under consideration with colleagues in the Writing Studies Department and the School of Education and Human Development. She is also co-author (with colleagues Ava Brillat and Matthew Kaeiser) of “Crossing the Bridge: Writing and Research Bridge Programming for an Intensive English Program” in PILH: Information Literacy and Writing Studies, Volume II – Upper Level and Graduate Studies. Ed. Grace Veach. Purdue University Press, 2019. She is also the author of “Structure and Accommodation: Autism and the Writing Center”, in Autism Spectrum Disorders in the College Composition Classroom: Making Writing Instruction more Accessible for all Students. Eds. Walsh, Lynda and Gerstle, Val. Marquette University Press, 2011. In addition, she was also a contributor to and reader for Composing Inquiry: Methods and Readings for Investigation and Writing. Margaret Marshall, Prentice Hall, 2004.

Past Speakers
September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD |
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

October 31 | Video Link Forthcoming . . .

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

November 14 | Video Link Forthcoming . . .
TALK TITLE: “The Future of Making, Teaching, and Learning Music: Exploring Artificial Intelligence and Music”

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

Virtual AI Lecture Series Exploring Practical Applications—Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes 3/20
2026-03-20 14:00 - 16:00 | Zoom (online)
Hosted by Joseph Johnson and Mitsunori Ogihara, this new webinar series promotes the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) among University of Miami faculty, staff, and students, and the surrounding community.
Each session explores practical applications of AI in research, business, and everyday life. The content of these lectures is tailored for a general, non-technical audience and concludes with a Question and Answer session. All lectures take place via ZOOM on Fridays from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, and are free and open to the public. An email confirmation containing the ZOOM link will be sent upon completion of registration.
March 20 | Register Now

Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes, MD
L E C T U R E R
Business Technology Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Prof. Dr. Ingrid Vasiliu-Feltes is a visionary leader operating at the intersection of academia, business, government and not-for-profit sectors, recognized globally for her deep tech diplomacy and digital ethics efforts.
With over two decades of executive experience, she has held numerous high-impact leadership roles and has extensive complex system integration expertise, driving the development of responsible, inclusive, diverse, sustainable AI, blockchain and other deep tech innovation ecosystems at a regional, national or international level. Her unique background positions her as a thought leader on how emerging or frontier technologies are posing unique ethical challenges and are reshaping law, regulatory frameworks, corporate governance, risk management, compliance and enterprise digital strategy.
She is an alumna of MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia University, and University of Miami’s Herbert Business School. In addition, she is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, holding executive certifications in AI, Blockchain, Finance, Mediation, Tech Diplomacy, Human Rights, and Ethics. Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes has served as an expert advisor to numerous Fortune 100 and 500 companies, US DOD, IEEE, NIST, and EU, UN or G20-affiliated organizations, guiding them on strategic decisions around digital transformation, digital risk governance, digital trust, and digital cyber-ethics orchestration. Read more . . .
Read this NEWS@TheU PROFILE of Dr. Vasiliu-Feltes: “We have to rethink everything”

April 10 | Registration Link Forthcoming . . .

April Mann, MD
D I S T I N G U I S H E D S E N I O R L E C T U R E R
and Director of the Writing Center
Department of Writing Studies
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES

April Mann, EdD, is Director of the Writing Center and is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer in the Department of Writing Studies. She also provides grant-writing support to the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) at the Miller School of Medicine. April has been facilitating the College of Arts and Sciences’ Summer Writing Institute with her colleague Adina Sanchez-Garcia since 2015. The Institute helps faculty throughout the college reimagine the ways they can use writing in their courses to improve their students’ disciplinary learning. She and her colleagues are in the process of initiating a Writing Enriched Curriculum program to support faculty in other disciplines who want to effectively use writing assignments in their teaching.
For the past two years, she has been co-facilitating a Faculty Working Group for Teaching with AI. This community of practice brings faculty together to discuss their innovative work with AI in the classroom. She also presented at the Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence 2024 Conference. April is co-author of several publications, most recently “The linguistic leap: Understanding, evaluating, and integrating AI in language education.” Journal of Language Teaching, (with colleagues Shai Cohen, Ludovic Mompelat, and Logan Connors). She has several manuscripts currently under contract or under consideration with colleagues in the Writing Studies Department and the School of Education and Human Development. She is also co-author (with colleagues Ava Brillat and Matthew Kaeiser) of “Crossing the Bridge: Writing and Research Bridge Programming for an Intensive English Program” in PILH: Information Literacy and Writing Studies, Volume II – Upper Level and Graduate Studies. Ed. Grace Veach. Purdue University Press, 2019. She is also the author of “Structure and Accommodation: Autism and the Writing Center”, in Autism Spectrum Disorders in the College Composition Classroom: Making Writing Instruction more Accessible for all Students. Eds. Walsh, Lynda and Gerstle, Val. Marquette University Press, 2011. In addition, she was also a contributor to and reader for Composing Inquiry: Methods and Readings for Investigation and Writing. Margaret Marshall, Prentice Hall, 2004.

Past Speakers

September 26 | Watch Now

Indraneel Chakraborty, PhD |
D E P A R T M E N T C H A I R a n d P R O F E S S O R
Finance Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Chakraborty received his Ph.D. in finance from Wharton, an M.S. from MIT, and a B.Tech. from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (President of India Gold Medalist). He has worked for Citadel Investments and Citigroup Global Markets Inc.’s fixed income divisions. Dr. Chakraborty has won multiple awards for his research and teaching. He received the excellence in teaching award in the Master of Science in Finance program each year from 2018 to 2023). In 2018, Poets and Quants recognized him as one of the top 40 under 40 business school professors. Read more . . .

October 17 | Watch Now

Tom Collins, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Engineering Technology
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Tom is an Associate Professor of Music Engineering Technology within the Music Engineering program at the Frost School of Music and Principal Investigator of the Music Computing and Psychology Lab (situated in the Frost School of Music). His research concerns the development and application of machine learning techniques for/to music-analytical and music-generative tasks, with projects leading to research papers, reusable code, and collaborations with upcoming and GRAMMY Award-winning artists on songs co-created with AI. The lab also works on audio/music in extended reality (XR/AR/VR), AI for podcasting and game audio, and pattern discovery algorithms applied to coordinated movement in music and athletics.
Dr. Collins has a strong track record in the supervision of PhD students—training them and helping them pursue careers in industry or academia, with recent graduates joining ByteDance, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
In terms of teaching, Dr. Collins offers courses on electronic production technologies, research methods, and music artificial intelligence. Read more . . .

October 31 | Watch Now (link forthcoming)

Joseph Johnson, PhD
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Marketing Department
MIAMI HERBERT BUSINESS SCHOOL
Dr. Johnson teaches Marketing Analytics, New Product Development, Strategic Brand Management and a doctoral seminar on quantitative methods for marketing management. He has thirty-two years of experience, divided between academia and industry, in computerization and empirical models for manufacturing, supply chain and marketing. His current research focuses on the use of AI and text mining tools as a decision aid for managers. Dr. Johnson has created and collaborated in the development of:

Deep learning algorithms for advertising design and testing
Brand management tools using text mining
Customer satisfaction and service quality measurement tools using text mining
Dynamic optimization methods for retail promotions
Media planning tools for big Pharma
Digital media analytics for non-profit organizations
Clinic scheduling model for UM’s clinics
Risk models for predicting post-surgery health outcomes. Read more . . .

November 14 | Watch Now (link forthcoming)

Reynaldo Sanchez, MM
A S S O C I A T E D E A N
Strategic Initiatives + Innovation
A S S O C I A T E P R O F E S S O R
Music Business + Entertainment
FROST SCHOOL OF MUSIC
Dean Sanchez is a multi-faceted educator and musician. As the Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, he has been responsible for expanding the educational opportunities offered by the Frost School of Music overall. An accomplished multi-tasker, he also serves as Director of the Bruce Hornsby Creative American Music Program, an innovative performing and songwriting program curriculum developed with Frost School alumnus Bruce Hornsby to incorporate both American roots music and contemporary composition. The program has become one of the School’s fastest growing areas of study. It also offers those with an interest in electronic music performance an opportunity to become full music majors, a first for a major music school in the U.S. Read more . . .

February 20 | Register Now

Andres Sawicki, JD
P R O F E S S O R O F L A W
Director, Business of Innovation, Law, & Technology concentration
SCHOOL OF LAW
D I R E C T O R
Data Ethics & Society
FROST INSTITUTE FOR DATA SCIENCE AND COMPUTING
Prof. Sawicki teaches in the area of intellectual property. His primary research projects explore the extent to which IP can help solve problems in the production of inventions and expressive works. He is particularly interested in the complex psychology of creativity, and in the difficulty of coordinating multiple creative collaborators. Professor Sawicki’s research also examines the interaction among distinct patent doctrines.
Professor Sawicki graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology with S.B. degrees in Brain & Cognitive Sciences and Science, Technology, & Society. He then earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 2006, where he was an Articles Editor for the Law Review and a member of the Order of the Coif. After graduation, he clerked for the Honorable Robert D. Sack of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 2007 through 2010, he worked as an associate in the New York office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. His practice focused on intellectual property litigation, especially Hatch-Waxman Act pharmaceutical patent cases. Prior to his appointment at Miami Law, Professor Sawicki was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.
His work has been published by leading journals, including Cornell Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, and The University of Chicago Law Review, among others. Read more . . .

Smart Cities MIAMI 2026: 10 Years of Lessons, Leaps, and the Road Ahead 3/26
2026-03-26 09:00 - 17:00 | Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL, 33146, United States
Save the Date: Thursday, March 26, 2026 for the 10th edition of the University of Miami Smart Cities MIAMI Conference. We are celebrating a decade of innovation and progress in building smart cities as we envision the future.
Register Now | $50 per person*
*Attendance for University of Miami Faculty, Staff, and Students is complimentary. Please email idsc@miami.edu for the PROMO CODE.
We are excited to announce our keynote speakers: Patrick Murphy, CEO of Togal AI and Dr. Dan M. Frangopol, a member of the National Academy of Engineering.
The morning session opens with an Industry Expo showcasing cutting-edge technologies from faculty innovators, start-ups, and major corporations. Attendees will have the opportunity to engage directly with solution providers and end-users influencing the future of urban environments.
The afternoon session brings together thought leaders and experts for keynote talks and interactive panel discussions on smart city concepts. The discussion is organized around three core themes:

Built Environment and Infrastructure (BEI) focuses on how to construct smart cities. This panel transitions the conversation from software as a service to the physical built environment. Panelists will explore how advances in AI and technologies are enabling cities to better sense and respond to people’s needs. Attendees will gain insights through real-world case studies and discover how smart cities are transforming the way we live.
Health and Wellbeing (HW) focuses on leveraging smart technologies to improve the well-being in our communities. Panelists will focus the discussion on sensors, innovative technologies, and other digital platforms that monitor health, advance precision medicine, improve hospital efficiency and effectiveness, and promote better public health outcomes.
Community and Resilience (CR) focuses on smart city technologies that can strengthen community resilience and enhance the ability for communities to prepare for, respond to, and recover from natural hazards.

Agenda TBA
Location
Newman Alumni Center, 6200 San Amaro Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146

Keynote Speakers

Patrick Murphy | CEO, Togal AI
With a background in government and a passion for innovation, Patrick transitioned into the world of construction technology to drive impactful change. As Managing Director of Renco and Founder of Togal AI, he is dedicated to revolutionizing the construction industry by implementing greener, more advanced, and efficient solutions. His work focuses on integrating AI to streamline processes, reduce costs, and make construction more sustainable. From enhancing estimation accuracy to developing materials that minimize environmental impact, Patrick is committed to pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in construction tech.

Dan M. Frangopol, PhD | NAE Life-Cycle Management + Member, National Academy of Engineering
Dr. Dan Frangopol is the inaugural Fazlur R. Khan Endowed Chair of Structural Engineering and Architecture Emeritus at Lehigh University. Before joining Lehigh University in 2006, he was Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder, where he is now Professor Emeritus. He is recognized as a leader in the field of life-cycle engineering of civil and marine structures. Dr. Frangopol is the Founding President of both the International Association for Bridge Maintenance and Safety (IABMAS) and the International Association for Life-Cycle Civil Engineering (IALCCE).
Frangopol is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Construction, and a foreign member of the Canadian Academy of Engineering, Mexican Academy of Engineering, Academy of Europe (London), Engineering Academy of Japan, Royal Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts, Romanian Academy, and Romanian Academy of Technical Sciences. He is a distinguished member of ASCE, founder and editor-in-chief of Structure and Infrastructure Engineering, and holds 5 honorary doctorates and 14 honorary professorships from major universities. He has authored/co-authored 5 books, more than 70 book chapters, and over 500 articles in refereed journals including 15 award-winning papers.
In 2023, ASCE established the Dan M. Frangopol Medal for Life-Cycle Engineering of Civil Structures.
Read Dr. Frangopol’s full profile here.

Speakers

Tom Merrick, MA | Sr. Project Manager, XR Initiatives, University of Miami Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing (IDSC) Creative Technologies program + Adjunct Professor, School of Communication
Tom Merrick, Assistant Director of VR/AR Initiatives, is a seasoned educator and technology enthusiast. He holds a BS in Information Engineering from Cornell and an MA in Independent School Leadership from Columbia. With 15 years of experience in education, including roles as a Math Director and School Administrator, Tom brings a unique perspective on technology’s role in learning.
Tom’s journey led him to accept a fellowship at Stanford University’s Distinguished Career Institute (DCI), where he discovered the potential of Virtual Reality to revolutionize education. He taught VR courses at Stanford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab and continued as an educator with Stanford Continuing Education. Now, at the University of Miami, Tom is passionate about teaching “Intro to VR” while exploring innovative ways to support faculty and students in harnessing immersive technologies for transformative learning experiences. His expertise and vision are integral to our mission of reshaping education through VR and AR.

Helena Solo-Gabriele, PhD | Professor, University of Miami College of Engineering Department of Chemical, Environmental, and Materials Engineering
Dr. Helena Solo-Gabriele is a Professor at the University of Miami Department of Environmental Engineering where she teaches courses in environmental measurements, environmental engineering microbiology, and in water treatment systems. Her research focuses on problems that relate the environment to human health. She conducts studies to identify sources of microbial contamination, uses wastewater to understand the spread of disease in communities, and evaluates sources and movement of arsenic in the environment. Her current active projects focus on evaluating the use of ultraviolet light for disinfecting street and sidewalk surfaces, using wastewater to track dengue virus spread, and evaluating the fate of arsenic at beaches from the seaweed called sargassum.

Deborah Franqui, PhD, AIA, NCARB, EDAC | Lecturer, University of Miami School of Architecture
Dr. Deborah Franqui is a healthcare research and planning leader whose work integrates rigorous methodology with innovative design solutions. With a B.Arch, MS, and PhD from Cornell and Clemson University, she has conducted more than 30 post-occupancy evaluations across diverse healthcare departments, translating findings into actionable, evidence-based design guidelines. Her expertise spans Lean planning, operational and space-efficiency optimization, and user experience enhancement. Dr. Franqui’s research-driven design frameworks and design-checklist methodologies—presented at nationally recognized healthcare design conferences—continue to influence best practices and elevate outcomes for healthcare facilities and the communities they serve.

Maurice Jenkins, IAP CM | Chief Innovation Officer, Miami-Dade County, Aviation Department
With more than thirty years of experience committed to achieving strategic growth and technology objectives for MIA, Maurice Jenkins has been a keen adopter to self-service technologies and has encouraged airlines serving the airport to embrace innovation also. Prior to his role as a CIO, Mr. Jenkins was responsible for defining and managing IT capital assets and IT management processes to ensure their successful implementation and project integration. In addition, he served as the Aviation Department’s Chief Information Officer/Director of Information Systems, responsible for the development and implementation of standards‐based policies and procedures that support business operations which improved the overall quality of service of enterprise IT systems. His strategic vision has successfully culminated in the integration of new technology in the opening of the new South and North Terminals at Miami International Airport. In addition, the success of these new system implementations such as Biometrics, Virtual Queuing and new innovating technologies show his technical acumen and dedication to serve the residents of Miami‐Dade County.
Mr. Jenkins has implemented an area wide marketing information service to both hotels and conventions centers using current flight information data from Miami International Airport. AAAE and ACI best in practice initiatives are strictly adhered to that display his commitment to providing the highest level of service governed by industry standards. He graduated from the University of Miami with a Bachelor’s degree in Business and Computer Information Systems. He also earned certifications in Strategic Management from Florida International University and Human Resources Management from Nova Southeastern University. He served as the Chairman of the Business Information Technology Committee (BIT), which was established by Airports Council International (ACI) to set strategic objectives future technology direction for airports. He was also served as Chairman of the Florida Airports Council’s Information Technology Committee from February 2019 until December 2021. Mr. Jenkins has given presentations on implementation solutions to key IT leaders and airport IT conferences in the U.S. and internationally sharing his proven successful practices with his peer group.

Brian Freed, CFA | CEO, Illuminex AI
Brian Freed, a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), has a career path that reflects a unique blend of experience in business analysis as well as successful operational execution in the establishment and growth of new businesses focused on data-centric applications.
As the CEO of Illuminex AI, Brian is committed to democratizing the implementation of Computer Vision and AI with a focus on bespoke applications where challenges such as data scarcity and technical integration hinder the development of precise and cost-effective solutions. He has a proven track record of driving growth in both startup and globally established environments. His extensive financial background and broad technical knowledge make him a proven leader in solution development, strategic alliances, go-to-market strategies, and sales.
Before joining Illuminex AI, Brian held the position of Chief Operating Officer at Eagle Aerospace, a company specializing in Airfield Technology solutions. He also served as the COO for Phizzle, a developer of IoT software that facilitated remote monitoring and control of quality and compliance solutions used in pharmaceutical manufacturing. Prior to these roles, Brian was the General Manager of the High-Performance Data Analytics (HPDA) business unit at SGI. He established this unit from scratch and successfully grew it to a $50M annual run rate.
In addition to his experience in the tech industry, Brian spent 13 years on Wall Street as a Chartered Financial Analyst. During this time, he focused exclusively on research, financial modeling, and stock recommendations for companies specializing in High-Performance Computing (HPC) and Data Lifecycle technologies.

Xu Sun, PhD AMASCE | Assistant Professor, Department of Management Science, Miami Herbert Business School
and Co-Founder & CEO, AIWaysion, Inc.

Xu Sun is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management Science at the Miami Herbert Business School, University of Miami. He studies how applied probability, optimization, and data-driven analytics can be used to design intelligent and resilient service systems in smart cities. His research develops online algorithms for real-time decision-making under uncertainty, with applications in call centers, emergency response, smart manufacturing, and energy and mobility systems.
Before joining the University of Miami, Professor Sun was an Assistant Professor in the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering at the University of Florida. He received his Ph.D. in Operations Research from Columbia University. His work has appeared in leading journals in operations research and management science, and he has received recognition from INFORMS, the Institute for Mathematics and its Applications (IMA), and the University of Miami.

Brian Brooke, MPP MBA | Executive Vice President, AIWaysion

Brian Brooke is Executive Vice President at AIWaysion, bringing over twenty-five years of experience in project management, organizational development, research, market strategy, pricing, and policy development. Before joining AIWaysion, Brian established and led the Research and Innovation team at Sound Transit, the Seattle region’s largest transit agency. In that role, he built and directed a portfolio of data-driven initiatives and cross-sector partnerships to improve customer and community satisfaction, operational efficiency, accessibility, equity, and the long-term sustainability of regional mobility.
Earlier in his career, Brian held roles at King County, R.B. Webber, the City of Seattle, the U.S. Department of Commerce, and PACCAR, giving him deep experience across the public sector, private industry, and consulting. Brian holds an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley, a Master of Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School, and a BA in Economics from the University of Washington.

Exhibitors
AIWaysion
Leveraging AI and Edge Computing for Safer and More Efficient Transportation
AIWaysion develops next-generation Connected Vehicle technology and provides Smart Mobility Solutions using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Edge Computing technologies for safer and more efficient transportation.
