Art & Art History
Yuxiang Dong
Full-time Lecturer
Yuxiang Dong is an art, educational, and social worker. His current practices and research are driven by the contradiction between ethnography in the Anthropocene and speculation of object-oriented ontology. He holds a BFA in Photography from Beijing Film Academy, an MFA in Imaging Arts from Rochester Institute of Technology, and a PhD in Media, Art, and Text from Virginia Commonwealth University. Prior to UM, he has taught at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Cincinnati, Art Academy of Cincinnati, Virginia Commonwealth University, and Rochester Institute of Technology.
Biology
Juan Pablo Quimbayo
Assistant Professor
I am an ecologist who uses a multidisciplinary approach to understand and conserve marine and terrestrial biodiversity through different scales, and my lab focuses on exploring: (1) patterns and processes of biodiversity dynamics across space and time, (2) ecological interactions, and (3) effects of global change on biodiversity. To investigate these themes, we integrate theoretical concepts, statistical tools, and field-based methods across multiple scales.
Neil Rosser
Assistant Professor
My research is focused on understanding how new forms and species evolve, and the processes which then preserve this diversity once it exists. This involves working at the intersection of evolution, ecology, and genetics, and covering the full spectrum of biological organization, from molecules to ecosystems. I address these questions using tropical insects and plants, which are understudied but facing increasing threats. My overarching goal is to conduct curiosity-driven research that uncovers unifying principles underlying the origins and maintenance of biodiversity, while also advancing our understanding of how species and ecological communities are responding to global change.
Chemistry
Stephen Lee
Assistant Professor
Stephen Anthony Lee is a chemist studying light-matter interactions at the single object level using time- and frequency-resolved spectroscopy for quantum sensing and communication applications. He earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the University of Michigan studying enhanced single-molecule imaging in bacteria under Professor Julie Biteen. Afterward, Stephen joined Professor Stephan Link at Rice University as a Postdoctoral Fellow where he studied photoluminescence and photoinduced charge transfer from gold nanoparticles. Stephen then moved to the University of Illinois as a Postdoctoral Fellow with Professor Christy Landes where he studied the light emitting properties of carbon nanodots.
Classics
Charles Bartlett
Full-time Lecturer
Charles Bartlett received his Ph.D. in Ancient History from Harvard University, and subsequently taught at Duke University and at Harvard before joining the University of Miami in 2021. His research focuses on ancient law, the ancient economy, and ancient empires; he is most interested in the afterlives of these traditions and phenomena in later periods of history. His publications examine the formation of political institutions, the history of the corporation, and the importance of Roman law to the history of political economy.
Computer Science
Shengtian Sang
Assistant Professor
Shengtian Sang is an Assistant Professor in Computer Science. Prior to UM, he was a post-doctoral scholar at the Laboratory of Artificial Intelligence in Medicine and Biomedical Physics in the department of Radiation Oncology at Stanford University. He received his Ph.D. degree from the College of Computer Science and Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, China. His current research interests are high-dimensional data mining, medical image computing, and machine learning. In his Ph.D. study, he worked on the biomedical literature-based discovery and data mining.
English
Elisabeth Houston
Visiting Assistant Professor
Elisabeth Houston is an "artist" and "writer." She graduated from Yale and received an MFA in poetry from Boston University; they've taught at UC Riverside, Boston University, and Cal-State LA. Violence, gender, and race are explored through a character named "baby" who exists across forms – in text, video, performance, and digital media. Standard American English is her first collection of poetry; a second collection, Paper Fantasy, will come out in spring 2025 with Litmus Press.
Noa Nikolsky
Assistant Professor
Noa Nikolsky is a medievalist working at the intersection of literary studies and the history of medicine. She received her PhD from the University of Pennsylvania and holds degrees from the University of Cambridge in the UK and the University of Groningen in The Netherlands. Her book project examines the surge in writing on preventative medicine which occurred in Europe in the later Middle Ages. It looks at how preventative medicine influenced and was influenced by medieval reading cultures. Her writing is forthcoming in Studies in the Age of Chaucer and the Oxford Handbook of Middle English Prose.
Geography & Sustainable Development
Anna Merrill-Arango
Full-time Lecturer
Anna Merrill-Arango is a Lecturer in the Global Health Studies Program within the Department of Geography and Sustainable Development at the University of Miami. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Riverside, completed a master’s and EdD in Health Education concentrating in maternal health from Columbia University, and an MA from Pepperdine University.
Guimin Zhu
Full-time Lecturer
Dr. Zhu is a lecturer at the Department of Geography and Sustainable Development at the University of Miami. He completed his PhD at the University of Maryland, College Park with focus on applying machine learning algorithms to interpret human mobility patterns. His teaching experience includes topics in GIS, geospatial data analysis, programming, database systems, etc.
Mathematics
Cem Sayar
Full-time Lecturer
Dr. Cem Sayar is a Mathematician specializing in Differential Geometry, holding a PhD from Istanbul Technical University. He has completed postdoctoral research in multiple countries, including Romania and Italy. Actively engaged in research, Dr. Sayar is also dedicated to teaching excellence. He contributes to course development, employs diverse teaching methods, and regularly delivers talks on Collaborative Learning. In addition, Dr. Sayar mentors undergraduate and graduate students, guiding them in their research and teaching interests.
Gemma Alberto
Full-time Lecturer
Jesus A. Hernandez Salgado
Full-time Lecturer
My educational background includes my B.S. in Mathematics Education from the Universidad de Oriente, Venezuela. Two years later, I earned a Master of Arts in Mathematics from the University of Wisconsin - Madison in Wisconsin, USA. After spending 15 years teaching mathematics for Engineering majors, I attended the Florida Institute of Technology (Florida Tech), Florida, USA, where I earned a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics, I honed my communication and teaching skills in the Faculty of Engineering at the Universidad Central de Venezuela.
Jose Luis Varona Santana
Full-time Lecturer
I am an applied mathematician with over 6 years of experience in research, specializing in statistical models and computational modeling. I hold a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Centro de Investigación en Matemáticas in Mexico, where I developed advanced algorithms to enhance predictive accuracy. Additionally, I earned a Master’s in Statistics with a minor in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science from Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero, and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from Universidad Central de Las Villas in Cuba, both completed with honors. My technical expertise includes Python, R, SQL, and data visualization, alongside extensive teaching experience at the university level.
The Michele Bowman Underwood Department of Modern Languages & Literatures
Ludovic Mompelat
Assistant Professor
Ludovic Vetea Mompelat is an Assistant Professor of French Linguistics, Creolistics and Computational Linguistics. His research lies at the intersection of Natural Language Processing (NLP), Machine Learning, Corpus Linguistics, Syntax, and Sociolinguistics. His training in formal Linguistics with a focus on French and Creoles, as well as in Computational Linguistics allows him to use a mixed-method cross-disciplinary research approach in his work. His research is particularly articulated around two complementary axes: first, the linguistic study and formal development of Creole languages, and second, the creation of NLP solutions for under-represented languages and their promotion in the computational linguistics world.
Thomas Matusiak
Assistant Professor
Thomas Matusiak is a scholar of Latin American cultural studies whose work centers on cinema and contemporary audiovisual cultures. His research interests include political aesthetics, critical theory, film & media theory, documentary, and intermediality. He is currently revising a book manuscript entitled The Visual Guillotine: The Cinematic Cut and the Form of Politics in Latin America. He is excited to research two new projects at the University of Miami, tentatively titled After the Index: Expanded Documentary in Latin American Cinema and The Cinema and Its Double: Latin America and the Cinema of Cruelty. He holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University and was previously Postdoctoral Fellow at Dartmouth College, Visiting Scholar at Columbia University, and Assistant Professor at SWPS University in Warsaw, Poland. His research has been supported by the Polish National Science Center and the US Fulbright program.
Philosophy
Alison Springle
Assistant Professor
Alison works on topics in and at the intersections between philosophy of mind, perception, action, science, epistemology and the ethics of knowing. She's especially interested in the nature of representations, from the most basic kinds of mental representations to scientific representations and art works, and she's driven to understand mental representations in a way that does justice to both continuities and discontinuities between the minds of humans and other animals. Her work draws inspiration from Aristotle, Kant, American Pragmatists (especially Dewey), JJ Gibson, Elizabeth Anscombe, and Ruth Millikan among others. She's developing a systematic account of intentionality that centers on the concept of organisms' needs for flourishing (very broadly construed). She argues for three fairly radical theses: (1) That actions are developmental teleological processes that function to satisfy, and are type-individuated partly in terms of, needs for flourishing; (2) That mental representations are the "acorns" of such developmental processes; and (3) That mental representations belong to a hitherto neglected "de agendo" species of representation; similar to what Millikan calls "pushmi-pullyus" or (borrowing from Gibson) "affordance representations." Alison puts these views to work addressing problems in the philosophy of mind, action, perception, science, epistemology, and the ethics of knowing. Some of her work on the ethics of knowing examines connections between conceptions of the proper functioning of mnemonic capacities and certain forms of epistemic injustice that impact trauma survivors. '
Before coming to the University of Miami, Alison was Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oklahoma.
Seth Goldwasser
Full-time Lecturer
I have a Doctorate in Philosophy from University of Pittsburgh's Philosophy Department. Prior to coming to Pitt, I received my BA in Philosophy from Auburn University after transferring from Winthrop University.
I work primarily on mental action, memory, and imagination. I also have interests in epistemic injustice as well as biological normativity and function.
My doctoral research focuses on skillful mental action, proposing that the activity of constructing representations in imagining is skillful and that mnemic processing that results in declarative remembering is an extension of this skillful activity.
Physics
Hebin Li
Professor
Hebin Li is currently a Professor in the Department of Physics at the University of Miami. He earned his BS in Physics from Wuhan University and his PhD in Physics from Texas A&M University in 2010. Following his doctoral studies, Dr. Li worked as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at JILA, a joint institute of the University of Colorado Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Before joining UM in 2024, Dr. Li was an Associate Professor of Physics at Florida International University.
Dr. Li’s research focuses on the experimental study of many-body quantum systems and their potential applications in Quantum Information Science (QIS). The emerging quantum revolution (Quantum 2.0) promises transformative advances in sensing, computing, modeling, and communication. To fully harness the power of quantum mechanics, the QIS platform must involve many-body systems with interacting or coupled single quantum entities (or qubits). Dr. Li’s group employs advanced laser spectroscopic techniques to study exotic single quantum entities, such as single photons, single atoms, and atom-like solid-state entities. These many-body systems of single quantum entities are prepared in the lab to investigate fundamental many-body physics and realize novel applications in QIS. His research operates at the intersection of optics, atomic physics, quantum materials, and QIS. Interested students are encouraged to contact Dr. Li for potential research opportunities.
Miguel Antonio Nieto
Full-time Lecturer
I obtained my PhD in Astrophysics from the National Institute of Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics (INAOE) in Puebla, Mexico. My research interests focus on astronomical instrumentation and the modernization of physics laboratories to align them with current techniques that students will use in their future careers. I have over twenty years of experience teaching various general physics programs, computing, circuits, and electronics through lectures, discussion classes, and laboratories.
Pawel Jung
Assistant Professor
Pawel is a Physicist specializing in Optics and Photonics. Prior to joining the Department of Physics at the University of Miami, he served as a Research Scientist and Instructor Scholar at the College of Optics and Photonics (CREOL) at the University of Central Florida. His research primarily focuses on the intersection of non-Hermitian and topological properties with optical nonlinear processes, leading to emergent optical phenomena. His work spans both fundamental research and applied applications, including on-chip light sources and nonlinear optical dynamics and solitons.
Pawel earned his PhD in Physics with Honors from the Faculty of Physics at Warsaw University of Technology. He previously completed both his master’s and bachelor's degrees in applied physics at the same university. His academic achievements have been recognized with several awards and fellowships, including the University of Central Florida Preeminent Postdoctoral Program, and a prestigious scholarship for outstanding PhD students through the European Union program. His research contributions have secured multiple funding opportunities in both the United States and the European Union.
Political Science
Ruowen Shen
Assistant Professor
Ruowen Shen is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Miami. As a local governance scholar, her research centers on collaborative networks in urban sustainability, social equity and distributional consequences of urban sustainability, and inter-governmental relations. She has published in Public Administration Review, Urban Affairs Review, and the Journal of Urban Affairs.
Ruowen earned her Ph.D. in Public Administration and Policy from Florida State University in 2019 and an MPA from the University of Miami in 2013.
Stephanie Puello
Assistant Professor
Dr. Stephanie Puello is a new Assistant Professor at the University of Miami in the Department of Political Science. Her research interests include voting rights, political participation and engagement, and administrative burdens. Her dissertation research focused on voting rights restoration policies for formerly incarcerated citizens. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affairs. Her published research can be found in Public Administration and Administrative Theory & Praxis.
Psychology
Johayra Bouza
Full-time Lecturer
Melissa Noya
Full-time Lecturer
Dr. Melissa Noya is a Lecturer in the Department of Psychology at the University of Miami, bringing over 13 years of experience in clinical psychology and higher education. As a licensed psychologist, Dr. Noya earned her PsyD in Clinical Psychology with a specialization in Child and Adolescent Psychology from Albizu University in Miami, Florida. She completed her predoctoral internship with the Miami-Dade County Department of Human Services and her postdoctoral residency at Nova Southeastern University.
Dr. Noya is deeply passionate about teaching and has been teaching psychology students since 2011. She finds immense fulfillment in the classroom, where she inspires and mentors her students through her extensive knowledge and enthusiasm for the field.
Mingbo Cai
Assistant Professor
Dr. Mingbo Cai is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology and is affiliated with the Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience Division. Before joining the University of Miami, he directed a lab at International Research Center for Neurointelligence at the University of Tokyo, after completing postdoc training with Yael Niv at Princeton University and Ph.D. training with David Eagleman and Wei Ji Ma at Baylor College of Medicine. His lab currently investigates three areas: (1) using brain imaging to study the contents and dynamics of spontaneous thoughts, with the ultimate goal of understanding rumination in mental disorders; (2) using cognitive tasks and computational modeling to study decision-making, learning and internal model building in goal-driven behavior, and how these processes relate to mental health; (3) finding learning principles to form building blocks of our mental world such as the notion of objects by developing neural networks to learn with similar constraints faced by infants.
Sociology and Criminology
Hadis Dastgerdizad Elyaderani
Assistant Professor
Dr. Hadis Dastgerdizad Elyaderani earned her PhD in Community Health from Wayne State University. Her research focuses on understanding and addressing the root causes of health inequities experienced by immigrants/refugees, with a particular focus on healthy food access, nutritional behavior, obesity control, and prevention. She employs qualitative and quantitative research methods to develop and implement tailored environmental and behavioral approaches to account for the contexts and experiences of immigrant communities. She seeks to refine existing health-promoting strategies to improve the racial and ethnic diversity and generalizability of public health research. In her recent study in immigrant enclaves of Michigan, Dr.Elyaderany created a scoring system for evaluating the sugar-sweetened beverages marketing to infants and toddlers. Her work has also included studies of youth wellness and health disparities and health improvement interventions in Iran. Throughout her career, she received funding for her research, and her works have been published in the Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health and the Journal of Nutrients and presented in APHA and SOPHE.
Theatre Arts
Jordan Jones
Full-time Lecturer
Jordan “J.J.” Jones received her Master of Fine Arts in Stage Management and a Certificate in College Teaching at the University of Iowa. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Theatre from Carson-Newman University. In addition to her educational accomplishments, Jordan has a diverse professional background in regional theatres, on tour, in venue management, and on commercial projects.
Ramanjaneyulu Doosari
Assistant Professor
Ramanjaneyulu Doosari is a distinguished Actor Trainer, Director, and Practitioner-Researcher with sixteen years of extensive experience in the performing arts across India, the UK, UAE, and China. He joins the University of Miami with a rich background, having previously course-led Acting and Movement at Sharjah Performing Arts Academy and led the Department of Performing Arts at LPU. Raman holds an MFA in Actor Training and Coaching from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London; an MA in Acting from the National School of Drama, New Delhi; and an MPA in Theatre Arts from the University of Hyderabad, India.
As a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, Raman is recognized for his academic excellence, having received prestigious scholarships and grants, including the Global Impact Grant from Advance HE. His contributions to the field are marked by impactful research and performances. Raman's teaching expertise in both conservatoires and academia spans actor training, artist development, physical theatre, devising, and new work creation. He has performed in over fifty major productions and collaborated with renowned international and national theatre directors.
Raman's commitment to nurturing the next generation of talent is evident in his proficiency in curriculum development, festival management, and workshop facilitation. His diverse training in traditional Indian theatre forms and various Western acting techniques enriches his approach, making him a versatile educator in the performing arts industry.
Thomas Meacham
Associate Professor
Thomas Meacham (Ph.D. in Theatre, The Graduate Center, C.U.N.Y.) has previously served as the Associate Dean of Undergraduate Studies for University of Connecticut’s School of Fine Arts and the Arts Center Director for Lake Superior State University. His research focuses on the pedagogical performance practices of the medieval universities in addition to more contemporary examinations of performativity and role immersion. His monograph, The Performance Tradition of the Medieval English University: The Works of Thomas Chaundler, was published by De Gruyter in 2020.
Writing Studies
Aaron Hatrick
Full-time Lecturer
Adam Abraham
Full-time Lecturer
Adam Abraham earned a doctoral degree in English at the University of Oxford, where he studied imitations and plagiarisms of nineteenth-century British novels. He is the author of three books: Attack of the Monster Musical: A Cultural History of Little Shop of Horrors (Bloomsbury), Plagiarizing the Victorian Novel: Imitation, Parody, Aftertext (Cambridge), and When Magoo Flew: The Rise and Fall of Animation Studio UPA (Wesleyan). His writing has also appeared in Literary Hub and Dickens Quarterly. Previously, he taught at Virginia Commonwealth University, Auburn University, Cornell College, and Oxford. He is from New York City.
Benjamin Wilson
Full-time Lecturer
Benjamin Wilson is a Writing Studies Instructor in the College of Arts and Sciences. He earned an MFA in fiction from Florida Atlantic University. He received his undergraduate in English from the University of Iowa. His interests include science fiction, rhetoric, mythology, and epistemology, among other things. He is currently working on his second novel, a genre-blending adventure conspiracy that explores the nature of reality and humanity’s role within the universe. Previously, he has taught writing and literature at Florida Atlantic University.
Megan Ritchie
Full-time Lecturer
