Farzaneh Davari is a social science researcher who has worked in many diverse fields, including agriculture, conflict, health, and human rights, just to name a few. Currently, she is a Ph.D. candidate in Computational Social Science, focusing on social-ecological complex systems and applying computational science and Agent-Based Modeling to understand resilience procedure through self-organizing and learning. Meanwhile, she is a designer and instructor of the online graduate level course of Decision-making in Complex Environments in Virginia Tech.

My initial training was in cadastre and geodesy (B.Eng from the Distrital University, UD, Colombia). After earning my Master’s degree in Geography (UPTC, Colombia) in 2003, I worked for the “José Benito Vives de Andreis” marine and coastal research institute (INVEMAR) and for the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT). Three years later, in 2006, I left Colombia to come to Canada, where I began a PhD in Geography with a specialization in modelling complex systems at Simon Fraser University (SFU), under the direction of Dr. Suzana Dragicevic (SAMLab). In my dissertation I examined the topic of spatial and temporal modelling of insect epidemics and their complex behaviours. After obtaining my PhD in 2011, I began postdoctoral studies at the University of British Columbia (2011) and the University of Victoria (2011-2013), where I worked on issues concerning the spatial and temporal relationships between changes in indirect indicators of biodiversity and climate change.