Dr. Sami Houry is a senior research officer and project manager with Institutional Data Analysis at Athabasca University. He holds a BSc in physics from the University of Toronto (1997), an MBA from Memorial University of Newfoundland (2000), and a certified analytics and insights professional designation from CAIP Canada. In 2018, he earned his doctorate from Athabasca University.
Kathyrn R. Fair is a PhD candidate in applied mathematics at the University of Waterloo, supervised by Professor Chris T. Bauch and Professor Madhur Anand. Prior to entering graduate school, she completed a BSc (Hons) in physical science with distinction at the University of Guelph. The overarching theme of her research is modelling disturbances in coupled human-environment systems.
Majid Mirza is pursuing his PhD in Sustainability Management at the University of Waterloo with a focus on financing the Sustainable Development Goals. He has over 10 years of international development and impact investing experience and is a consultant to the Canadian Government on development finance.
Robert Gooding-Townsend is a master’s student in mathematical biology working under the supervision of Chris Bauch and Madhur Anand. Prior to his graduate work, he completed concurrent Bachelors’ of Knowledge Integration and Applied Mathematics at the University of Waterloo. His primary research area is forest dynamics and models of land cover change.
Clay Dasilva (PDF) is currently a PhD student in global governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, University of Waterloo, having also obtained his Master of Arts there in 2012.
Jorge is a PhD candidate of System Design Engineering at the University of Waterloo. His research activities are focused on applying agent-based models on three major areas
Christopher Luederitz is a PhD candidate at the Department of Geography and Environmental Management, where he researches on business-driven sustainability-oriented innovations in food systems. He is particularly interested in the role knowledge plays in the creation and use of sustainability innovations that have the ability to support transformations of entire food systems.
Perin Ruttonsha is a doctoral candidate with the School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability (SERS), at the University of Waterloo, and where she has worked in collaboration with the Waterloo Institute for Social Innovation and Resilience (W
Lesley Andrade, PhD Candidate, School of Health Sciences
Research interests: public health systems, healthy eating and nutrition policy, healthy weights promotions and eating disorders/disordered eating prevention, dietary assessment methods.
Examining the consumption of low-calorie sweeteners and applying an innovative method to estimating usual intake in Canada and abroad.
Christina Comeau is a PhD candidate in Social and Ecological Sustainability working under the supervision of Dr. Vanessa Schweiwer and Dr. Dan McCarthy. She is working on trans disciplinary application of complexity science to designing and governing interventions in social and environmental systems that lead to a just and sustainable future.
Truzaar Dordi is a PhD Candidate in Sustainability Management at the School of Environment, Enterprise, and Development, working under the supervision of Dr. Olaf Weber. His research utilizes advances in computational modelling to investigate the intersection between climate risk and financial resiliency.
Ajar Sharma is a Ph.D. student in Systems Design Engineering. He has a Masters in Water Management and background in hydrology and is currently working with Vanessa Schweiser (Knowledge Integration), and Keith Hipel (Systems Design Engineering). His research interests include climate change, water, Cross Impact Balances (CIB), conflict resolution, and sustainability.
Milton Friesen’s work includes serving on the executive team of Cardus, a public policy think tank, in addition to pursuing a PhD at the University of Waterloo, School of Planning.
Andjela Tatarovic enjoys learning and questioning the essence of things. Philosophy is a natural pass-time while quantifying ideas is more of a challenge, but enjoyed nonetheless. She likes learning the languages of things, and the relation between the abstract and the concrete.
Scott is a PhD candidate in Global Governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, University of Waterloo, where he studies the role of deep uncertainty in political decision-making. His research investigates the intersection of science and policy in the areas of climate change, infectious disease outbreaks, and artificial intelligence. Scott's dissertation research focuses on the role played by mathematical models as decision-support tools in the governance of catastrophic threats.
Julia Goyal is pursuing a Joint Interdisciplinary PhD at the University of Waterloo between the School of Public Health and Health Systems and Department of Mechatronics and Mechanical Engineering under the supervision of Dr. Ellen MacEachen and Dr. Arash Arami respectively.
Ileana I. Diaz is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Geography and Environmental Management at the University of Waterloo. Broadly, her research interests lie in the intersections of sustainable food systems, feminist geopolitics, climate and environmental justice.
Adrienne Mason is a Masters Candidate in the School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, supervised by Stephen Murphy. Adrienne completed her Environmental Science degree at Trent University and worked as an ecological restorationist creating and implementing
Joe Battikh is a senior sustainability expert with over sixteen years of international experience in the private sector. He has a strong interest in developing corporate sustainability through economic, environmental and social development.
Fatemeh Jahanmiri is currently completing her PhD in urban planning at the University of Waterloo under the supervision of Dr. Dawn Parker. Given her background in architecture and her interest in nature-inspired design, she followed her research in the field of complexity exploring the origin of fractal patterns in cities.
Nicholas Palaschuk is a PhD Candidate in the Sustainability Management program at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. Nicholas works in the fields of corporate sustainability, environmental behaviour, and sustainability transitions. Nicholas holds both a BSc. in Biology (2015) and MSc.
Haotian Zhang is currently pursuing a PhD degree in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo. He received the MS degree in electrical engineering from the University of Waterloo, Canada, in 2012. His research interests are in the areas of network science and design of fault-tolerant algorithms.
Ryan Johnson is a PhD candidate in the Sustainability Management program with the School of Environment, Enterprise and Development. His research explores sustainability transitions and transformations by investigating the development of sustainability reporting frameworks for agriculture, including the specific metrics they include, and their underlying paradigms and philosophies. Curiosity and eclecticism have also inspired Ryan to undertake transdisciplinary research and consulting work in a diversity of other areas, including economic and community development, climate change mitigation and adaption, and nature-based solutions planning.
Peter Jentsch is a PhD candidate in the Department Of Applied Mathematics at the University of Waterloo. Supervised by Dr. Chris T. Bauch and Dr. Madhur Anand, his research is primarily in the field of mathematical ecology and human-environment systems.
Kurniawan graduated from the inaugural Master of Climate Change program at the University of Waterloo and he is now working towards his PhD. For his doctoral research, Kurniawan is seeking to advance the methodological approach for better anticipating hard-to-foresee scenarios for complex social systems.
Katharine Zywert is a PhD student in the School of Environment, Resources, and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, where she studies medicine in the Anthropocene.
John Lang is currently completing a PhD in applied mathematics at the University of Waterloo under the supervision of Dr. Hans De Sterck. His work entails studying how mathematical modelling of human interaction and decision making over social networks might provide insight into the development and evolution of social movements like the Arab Spring.
Jinelle Piereder is a PhD candidate in global governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs (BSIA), specializing in conflict and security, and supervised by Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon. Drawing on complexity approaches and tools such as Cognitive-Affective Mapping (CAM) and network theory, Jinelle researches the contents, causes, and effects of ideological conflict within global governance and policymaking.
Yu Huang is currently completing her PhD degree in urban planning at the School of Planning, University of Waterloo. Her research focuses on the complex interactions within the urban housing market system and the emergent urban patterns and market dynamics.
Kirsten Lee is a PhD student in the School of Public Health and Health Systems at the University of Waterloo, working under the supervision of Dr. Sharon Kirkpatrick. Her research focuses on assessing the effect of consumer food environment interventions (e.g. menu labelling) on food/beverage purchases and intakes, as well as evaluating post-secondary food environments.
Katherine Laycock is currently enrolled in PhD studies at the University of Waterloo, School of Planning.
Marisa Beck is a PhD student in global governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs (BSIA), University of Waterloo, specializing in global environmental governance. Her research focuses on the interactions between three types of complex systems — the Earth’s climate, the global economy and social value and belief systems.
Diana searches for nutritional interventions addressing the complexity of malnutrition. In particular, she investigates the extent to which agroecology can improve nutrition in the long-term, through diversifying dietary intake and maintaining soil health.
Teresa Branch-Smith approaches complexity from a background in biochemistry and as a result is particularly interested in discussions about emergence that involve biology based examples. This can range from the study of protein interaction to the swarming behaviour of bees.
Chris Longley is a graduate student in applied philosophy and theoretical neuroscience. He is interested in the science and ethics of neuroprediction, as well as emerging technologies more broadly.
Academic Disciplines: Philosophy, Neuroscience, Artificial Intelligence
Application Areas: Psychology, Healthcare, Criminal Justice
Jim Jones, PhD Candidate, Social and Ecological Sustainability
The role of narratives in transitions towards sustainability through a social-ecological systems lens; the role of narrative as a tool to understand and work with complexity and 'wicked problems'. The tensions that arise at different spatial and temporal scales in the nexus of land, energy, technology, food and culture.
Ecological economics, systems thinking and complexity, participatory governance, food systems, sustainability transitions, participatory narrative inquiry, soft systems, complexity intervention
Alex Petric is a PhD Candidate in Urban Planning at the University of Waterloo, working under the supervision of Dr. Dawn Parker. His previous work includes master’s degrees in Rural Planning & Development (2019) and Applied Mathematics (2016).
Alex’s research explores how urban environments affect social capital, which refers to the density and quality of social connections and the benefits that flow from them. His studies focus in particular on missing middle housing (higher-density low-rise developments) and their potential community benefits. Alex's work uses agent-based modelling alongside in-field research to study how housing type and housing mix affect social capital formation, with an aim to help planning practice to support social connections and increase well-being for urban residents.