“A Physicist by training and a Data Scientist by trade!” - Saeed Mirshekari.

Solving complex problems has always been my passion. Since childhood, I’ve marveled at how Physics and data work hand-in-hand. With my growing hunger and intrigue for more, I started my pre-college and college education in Tehran and graduated with B.Sc. Physics in 2005.

With my continuous success in Physics, I pursued higher education as a graduate student in Gravitation and Astrophysics at the University of Tehran. When my Master's program rolled in, I decided to work on fundamental General Relativity and defended my thesis on this topic in 2008.

Without giving my studies any gap, I started my Ph.D. program at the Washington University in St. Louis under the supervision of a Distinguished Professor of Physics “Clifford Will”. He was my inspiration and a great teacher who nurtured me throughout my Ph.D. program, and later I defended my dissertation in 2013.

As soon as I completed my Ph.D. program successfully, I was awarded a fellowship by the top Brazilian Science Funding Agency FAPESP. There, I worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the International Center for Theoretical Physics in São Paulo, Brazil, ICTP-SAIFR (2013-2015).

During this time, I also worked as a researcher in the USA-based LIGO Scientific Collaboration.

A Few of My Notable Visits to Universities as a Visiting Research Scholar:

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (2011)
• Sorbonne Université (IAP) (2012)
• University of Florida (UF) (2012-2013)
• California Institute of Technology (Caltech) (2015)

Since then, I started my industrial career in Data Science in late 2015 and have been serving in multiple exciting roles and business sectors. I would love to share my skills and experience with other people and help their businesses grow and flourish.

Other than academia, my interests lie in:

• Any DIY project around the house.
• Gardening: I like growing new plants from the seed and watching them grow.
• Hiking: Katy trail in St. Louis is one of my old favorites.
• Chess: I enjoy playing Blitz and Live960 style.
• Volleyball: My favorite position to play is the setter.
• Ping Pong: I like making and receiving tough curved balls.
• Raspberry-Pi Projects: My recent project was making a person-detector security camera.
• My best buddy is my dog. His Name is Boujee. He is an American Staffordshire Terrier, or Amstaff in short. He has lived with us since he was 7 weeks old in March 2020.