Dr. Chaitra Gopalappa, PhD
Associate Professor, Industrial Engineering, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Associate Professor, Commonwealth Honors College, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Guest Researcher, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
chaitrag(at)umass(dot)edu
GRADUATE STUDENTS
2021 Sonza Singh, MS, Industrial Engineering LinkedIn
[IE/Software engineer iCIMS]
a. Best paper award, Institute for Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE), Simulation and Modeling track, 2021
2021 Nazanin Khatami, PhD, Industrial Engineering LinkedIn
[Post-doc at Harvard Medical school]
a. Finalist, student best paper poster competition, SMDM, 2018
2020 Shifali Shifali, MS in IEOR LinkeIn
[Quality Assurance intern at Super Brush, Summer 2019; At Amazon, 2020]
2020 Ron Mallach, PhD student in IEOR, Summer research, WebApp for COVID-19 model LinkedIn
2019 Buyannemekh Munkhbat, MS in IEOR, LinkedIn
[Interned at Stanford University, Summer 2018][Insight Data Engineering Fellowship Program, June 2019][Machine learning engineer, Vanguard, 2019]
a. Finalist, best paper award, INFORMS, UG Operations Research track, 2018
2019 Vijeta Deshpande, MS in IEOR LinkedIn [Interned at Avenir Health, Decision analytic modeling for non-communicable diseases, Fall 2018] [Mathematical modeler at the Massachusetts General Hospital, June 2019]
2018 Rahul Handa, MS in Computer Science – Visualization tools for large scale simulation metrics LinkedIn
UG HONORS THESIS
2022-2023, Ryanne McKenna, ICONS thesis,Evaluating the associations between the contraceptive pill and depression
a. IE Overall Excellence Award, MIE, UMAss
2021-2022, Lucy Zhen, Mathematics, Mt. Holyoke College, Multi-jurisdictional model of COVID-19 (co-chair)LinkedIn
2020-2021 Dennis Hofmann, Informatics,
Thesis title: Evolving contact network algorithm for the development of transmission network for HIV and injecting-drug use among homeless population in the US, Spring 2021 (chair)
a. Employment: PhD student/NSF NRT Trainee, Worcester Polytechnic University
2018-2019 Rebecca Castonguay, Thesis title: Predicting Degree Correlations Along Scale- Free Network Contagion Paths for use in the Evolving Contact Network Algorithm (chair) LinkedIn
a. Award: UMass Rising Researcher Award, 2019
b. Award: MIE best student award, 2019
c. Finalist, best paper award, INFORMS, UG Operations Research track, 2018
2017-2018 Matthew Eden, Mechanical Engineering/ Mathematics, Thesis title: Simulating the spread of HIV in America’s drug-use population (chair)LInkedIn
a. Award: Finalist, best paper award, INFORMS, UG Operations Research track, 2018
b. Employment: PhD student/RA, Northeastern University
MIE UNDERGRADUATE INDEPENDENT STUDY
Summer research 2021 Xinran (Lucy) Zhen
Summer research - 2022- James Kalio
IE Research star award, MIE, UMass
Summer research 2020– Dennis Hofmann, Informatics, Model-based analysis of integrated care for injecting drug use and HIV among homeless
Summer research 2020 – Nadia L’Bahy, Biology and Informatics, Model-based analysis of integrated care for mental health and HIV Honors thesis project, 2020; Summer research project, 2020
Spring 2019 – Doga Altinisik, Industrial Engineering, Graduate independent study, Analysis of Engineering Job Postings Using Web-Scraping and Machine Learning Predictions
Spring 2019 – Tudor Banari, Industrial Engineering, Reinforcement learning for automated vehicle control, Undergraduate Independent study
Fall 2017, Spring 2018 – Andrea Arredondo, Chemical Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Markov chain structure for risk between diseases for integrated analyses of disease prevention strategies
Spring 2017- Doga Altinisik, Industrial Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Clustering of countries by for analyses of cancer risk
Spring 2017- Andrea Arredondo, Chemical Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Markov chain structure for risk between diseases for integrated analyses of disease prevention strategies
Spring 2015 Jen Coppola, Industrial Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Modified network methodology for spread of infectious diseases
Spring 2015 Mike McGrath, Mechanical Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Markov chain modeling of breast cancer progression
CHC UNDERGRADUATE INDEPENDENT STUDY / SUMMER RESEARCH
Nadia L’Bahy, Informatics, Agent-based evolving network modeling for simulating mental health among HIV infected adults in the US, Summer research project, 2020
Dennis Hofmann, Informatics, Evolving contact network algorithm for the development of transmission network among injecting-drug use in the US national population, Summer research project, 2020
Summer 2018– Matthew Eden, Expansion of evolving contact network algorithm to generate scale-free networks Mechanical Engineering, research project
Summer 2018– Rebecca Castonguay, Studying properties of scale-free networks for generation of contact networks for HIV. Industrial Engineering, research project
Spring 2017- Yang Shi, Mechanical Engineering, Undergraduate Independent study, Study of genetic algorithms for optimization modeling.
Summer 2016- Alexandra Wrona, Public Health, Comparison of mammography screening guidelines globally and literature review of research informing these guidelines, research project.
Spring 2015- Brooke Herzog, Mathematics, Undergraduate Independent Study, Network modeling for analyzing spread of Ebola disease outbreak.
Fall 2014- Nora Murphy, Industrial Engineering, Undergraduate Independent Study, HIV Modes of Transmission Analysis: Kenya 2014.