About Me
Hello everyone, welcome to my website!
My name is Donya, I am a Ph.D. candidate at TTIC (it's a wonderful place to focus on Machine Learning theory at UChicago) where I am fortunate to be advised by Avrim Blum. My research primarily focuses on the theory of robustness, reliability, and explainability of predictions under adversarial attacks. When I'm not thinking about very concrete research questions, I like philosophizing about the [not so well defined] higher-level related concepts, such as [the meaning and means of] trust and safety.
I am naturally curious about the world around me and very enthusiastic about math! and as one once said, "Beautiful math tends to be useful, and useful things tend to have beautiful math." It didn't take me so long to realize understanding theoretical aspects of problems, particularly in Machine Learning, is a genuine delight to me.
"The beauty of mathematics only shows itself to more patient followers," and I would be lying if I said I was patient enough during my undergrad. Back then, I worked as an intern in different places, from the Sharif University of Technology, Iran, to the Max Planck Institute, Germany, and the University of Texas at Austin, USA. I had the opportunity to get to know fantastic people from all around the world, work with them, and learn from them, resulting in a paper accepted in ICML 2021 Self Supervised Learning Workshop, with an extension accepted in NetSci-X 2022. I was fortunate to work on my Bachelor's Thesis under the supervision of
Prof. Keshav Pingali from the University of Texas at Austin.
I was the first Bachelor's student in my university who has officially done her thesis internationally.
Education
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Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago, IL, USA
Sept. 2024—Sept. 2028 (Expected)
Ph.D. Candidate in Computer Science |
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Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago, IL, USA
Sept. 2022— June 2024
M.Sc. in Computer ScienceGPA: 4.0/4.0 |
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University of Tehran, Iran
Sept. 2017—July 2022
B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering—CommunicationsGPA: Final year: 19.58/20.00, Highest Distinctions. Minor in Computer Engineering |
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Farzanegan High School, Iran Sept. 2013—Jun. 2017
Diploma in Mathematics and Physics' DisciplineGPA: 20.00/20.00
Affiliated with the
National Organization for the Development of Exceptional Talents (NODET)
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Publications
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Research Experience
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Research Intern, Max Planck Institute for Dynamics of Complex Technical Systems Supervisor: Prof. Peter Benner Aug. 2021—Oct. 2021
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Research Intern, Intelligent Software Systems (ISS), University of Texas at Austin Supervisor: Prof. Keshav Pingali Feb. 2021—Aug. 2021
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Research Intern, Medical Imaging Lab, Sharif University of Technology Supervisor: Prof. Mohammad Hossein Rohban Sept. 2020—Nov. 2020
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Summer Intern, Data Science & Machine Learning Lab (DML), Sharif University of Technology Supervisor: Prof. Hamid R. Rabiee Summer 2020
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Teaching Experience
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Graduate Teaching Assistant, TTIC/The University of Chicago
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Undergraduate Teaching Assistant, University of Tehran
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Skills
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Programming Languages
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Engineering Softwares & Platforms:
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Foreign languages
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English, TOEFL iBT Total: 114, Reading: 28, Listening: 30, Speaking: 30, Writing: 26 Apr. 2021
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German, B2 |
Honors and Awards
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