Education

• Postdoctoral Training (2010-2012): Department of Biostatistics, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
• Ph.D. in Statistics (2005-2010) University of Mississippi

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Research Interests

• NSF grant on data science now  is recruiting undergraduate students in MATH majors with $5000 scholaorship per year per person. Contact Dr. Gao for details.
• Analysis of medical data ( funding available for graduate research assistant )
• Statistical and computational methods for the analysis of genetics/genomics data
• High dimensional biology and statistical computing
• Image and big data analysis

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Professional Development & Membership

• Editor of International Journal of Environmental Sciences & Natural Resources
• Member of American Statistical Association, ENAR,International Biometric Society , ICSA

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Teaching

I teach statistics and mathematics courses at all levels for undergraduates and graduates including

• Computational Statistics (new course for Ph.D and master students)
• Applied Statistical Methods
• Computational Statistics and Programming
• Mathematical Statistics
• Analysis of Variance
• Introduction to Probability and Statistics (online and face to face)
• Generalized Linear Models
• Statistical Machine Learning
• Calculus I (Hybrid and face to face)
• Calculus for Management, Life, and Social Sciences
• Introductory Statistics (online and face to face)

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Grants/Awards

• PI of Bimedical Research Initiation Collaborative Grant, "Assocaition of hyperchloremia and in-hospital mortality among critical ill adults patients", Jan 2020- June 2021. 
• Co-PI of NSF grant (#1924278) "HDR DSC: Collaborative Research: Transforming Data Science Education through a Portable and Sustainable Anthropocentric Data Analytics for Community Enrichment Program", 2019-2022.
• PI of 2017 University of Tennessee System CORNET Award (Collaborative Research Network) in cancer, 6/2017-6/2018
• Co-PI of MAA Dolciani Mathematics Enrichment Grant (PI: Andrew Ledoan)
• 2017 Dean's Award: Promising Young Researcher Award
• Co-PI, NSF I-MATH grant (PI: Jin Wang, NSF1520672 ), an Interdisciplinary MATH Training Platform (09/01/2015-08/31/2019).
• 2016 Univeristy of Tennessee Alumni Outstanding Teacher Award
• 2016 UTC Research and Creative Activity Grant
• 2015 Ruth Holmberg for Faculty of Excellence Award
• UTC Faculty Research and Development Grant (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017)