Piyushimita (Vonu) Thakuriah
Dean
Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
Biography
Vonu Thakuriah is Dean of the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, USA, Distinguished Professor of Transportation and Urban Informatics, and Director of the Rutgers Urban and Civic Informatics Lab. Vonu’s research interests are on transportation planning and operations; big data and social and economic cyber-infrastructure; and smart cities and urban informatics. Vonu was previously the Ch2M Endowed Chair Professor of Transport in the University of Glasgow, UK, and (founding) director and PI of the Urban Big Data Centre, a multi-university consortium funded by UK Research and Innovation that provided a UK-wide urban big data infrastructure. She is currently a member of the UK Office of National Statistics Data Science Advisory Board, and recent member of the scientific program committee of European Commission New Techniques and Technologies for Statistics. She recently chaired the International Expert Committee for the Canada Foundation for Innovation’s Smart Cities program. She has published over 200 journal refereed articles and reports. Vonu was previously a European Commission Marie Curie Fellow, and her postdoctoral work was funded by a fellowship program of the National Science Foundation’s Division of Mathematical Sciences.
Rutgers Climate Bridge Opening Remarks
Introduction to Bloustein and the long-term need for action against climate change.