Grand Challenge Initiative: Digital Innovation

Harbir Antil is head of the Center for Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence and a professor of mathematics at George Mason University. His areas of interest include optimization, calculus of variations, partial differential equations, numerical analysis, and scientific computing with applications in optimal control, shape optimization, free boundary problems, dimensional reduction, inverse problems, and deep learning. He also serves as the vice president of the SIAM Washington-Baltimore Section. 

Alireza Ermagun is the Director of Mobility Observatory and Data Analytics Lab and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Geoinformation Science at George Mason University. A common theme in his research activities is using emerging data and technologies, identifying novel solutions, developing practical methods, introducing innovative theories, and formulating policies and plans.

Rainald Löhner is a professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy and director of the Center for Computational Fluid Dynamics. His areas of interest include numerical methods, solvers, grid generation, parallel computing, visualization, pre-processing, fluid-structure interaction, shape and process optimization and computational crowd dynamics. His codes and methods have been applied in many fields, including aerodynamics of airplanes, cars and trains, hydrodynamics of ships, submarines and UAVs, shock-structure interaction, dispersion analysis in urban areas, hemodynamics of vascular diseases and pedestrian safety assessments.

Fereshte Ghahari is an associate professor of physics at George Mason University. Her major accomplishments were the discovery of fractional quantum hall effect and hydrodynamic thermoelectric transport in graphene which both proved the importance of interaction effects in this system. Before moving to George Mason University in 2019, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher at National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). Her current research interests lie in understanding topological and strongly correlated physics in low dimensional materials by a combination of electrical transport, thermopower, and scanning probe microscopy measurements. She is the recipient of Chien-Shiung award, DOE early career and NSF CAREER awards.

Patrick Vora is a physics professor at George Mason University who works with graduate and undergraduate students to study quantum phenomena in atomically-thin materials using optics, electronic transport, and magnetic measurements. He also is the Director of the Quantum Science and Engineering Center where his research focuses on quantum phenomena dominate when materials are reduced to nano-scale dimensions and lead to diverse optical, electronic, and magnetic properties distinct from the bulk form. Using a range of optical and electronic experimental techniques, he studies 2D materials (graphene, transition metal dichalcogenides, etc.), 1D materials (carbon nanotubes, DNA photonic wires, nanowire memristors), and heterostructures formed by combining these materials.