Five new academics join the Institute for Design Informatics

 

It has been a busy 2024 and we would like to take this opportunity at the start this 2024/2025 academic year here in Edinburgh, to welcome the five new fabulous colleagues who have joined the Institute for Design Informatics (IDI) community as academic faculty members across this year. 

In March this year we welcomed Shama Rahman.  Shama joined us from her role as Senior Lecturer in Neurodesign at the Hasso-Plattner Institute, Germany’s premier computer science HEI and is now an Innovation Fellow within IDI and Edinburgh Futures Institute. 

In May we welcomed Andrea Kocsis.  Andrea joined us from her role as Assistant Professor in History and Data Science at Northeastern University London, and is joining IDI as the new Chancellor’s Fellow in Humanities Informatics. Andrea will be helping establish Humanities Informatics here at Edinburgh. 

In Sept we welcomed two new colleagues Asad Khan and Calum Main both previously PhD students. Asad holds a practice-led PhD in Architecture from the University of Edinburgh and joins IDI as Teaching Fellow on our Masters Course. Calum previously a PhD student in Animation at Edinburgh College of Art (ECA) is joining IDI as Research Fellow working on CoSTAR and immersive technologies. 

Last but not least, earlier this month we welcomed Dorsey Kaufmann, who has joined us from Arizona where she worked on a number of projects with the World Bank, New York State’s Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) Energy Equity Collaborative, and on large-scale research grants awarded by the Mellon Foundation and the National Science Foundation. Dorsey is joining IDI and the Edinburgh Futures Institute and will be lecturing in data visualisation. 

 

As a joint enterprise between the University of Edinburgh’s School of Informatics and Edinburgh College of Art, we are very pleased that these new appointments are across the two School’s that form the Institute for Design Informatics, emphasising our ongoing interdisciplinarity and appreciation of diverse research practices. These five new appointments also highlight the breath of influences within our Institute on work encompassing design, architecture, animation and data visualisation. 

The warmest of welcomes to our new colleagues, especially as we start to enter the short days of late Autumn and Winter in Edinburgh. Welcome to the team! 

More information on each of the new IDI academic faculty members can be found below: 

 

Shama Rahman, Innovation Fellow 

Dr Shama Rahman is a neuroscientist, neurodesigner and AI practitioner with an expertise in AI/human collaborative systems, creative strategist and technologist, artist and entrepreneur. She is currently an Innovation Fellow at the University of Edinburgh, within Design Informatics and Edinburgh Futures Institute. Her R&D interests and expertise are at the confluence of designing AI tools, interventions and experiences for impact in enhanced innovation, cognitive augmentation, and healthy ageing with the lens of ethical neurodesign and responsible AI. 

Read More: https://www.designinformatics.org/person/shama-rahman/  

  

Andrea Kocsis, Chancellor’s Fellow in Humanities Informatics 

Dr Andrea Kocsis is a Chancellor’s Fellow in Humanities Informatics. Andrea comes from an interdisciplinary and international background. Before finding her path in digital humanities, she graduated in Communications, Archaeology, History, and Geography.  She collected these degrees at the Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Charles University in Prague, and EHESS Paris. 

Read More: https://www.designinformatics.org/person/andrea-kocsis/ 

 

Asad Khan, Teaching Fellow in Design Informatics 

Dr Asad Khan is a design researcher and computational architect. He runs the Entropy Project, a transdisciplinary practice, that combines field research, remote sensing, data science, machine learning, and architectural simulations into an augmented interface, to develop forensic-grade, immersive informatics of territories exposed to slow-acting and oblique forms of existential risks, anthropogenic violence and ecological warfare. 

Read More: https://www.designinformatics.org/person/asad-khan/ 

 

Calum Main is Post Doctorate Research Fellow working on CoSTAR and immersive technologies the UK Government’s Convergent Screen Technologies and performance in Realtime programme. His background is in animation, practising specifically Stop-Motion animation, his doctorate focused on educational infrastructures and the mindset required to successfully navigate creative industries. Through his own practice-based work, Calum is currently exploring pipelines that integrate immersive technologies with more traditional methods of animation, such as stop-motion 

Read More: https://www.designinformatics.org/person/calum-main/  

 

Dorsey Kaufmann, University Teacher 

Dorsey Kaufmann is a data visualisation designer, artist, and researcher who creates interactive data interfaces and participatory art installations. Employing digital design, data visualisation, code, sculpture, video, and technology; her work embodies the intimate and personal aspects of data collection and use – concerning people’s health, homes, local environment, and body politics. Her research further examines the use of visualisation as a creative medium to increase data literacy and shape human cognition, attitudes and behaviour in relation to the natural environment (see Nature article). 

Read more: https://www.designinformatics.org/person/dorsey-kaufmann/