​The planets, moons, and asteroids in our solar system offer a host of mysteries that if (when!) solved will enlighten us about processes occurring on Earth and throughout the universe.  As a planetary scientist, I study the geology and physics of the solid worlds orbiting the Sun in an effort to explore Earth’s neighborhood and shed light on how planets evolve.
 
NASA robotic spacecraft provide the data I use in my research.  During my Ph.D. at MIT and postdoctoral work at the University of Arizona, I’ve been involved with four of these NASA missions: the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and GRAIL missions studying the Moon, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter studying Mars, and the Dawn mission that orbited Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt.  These missions used a variety of scientific instruments to study the surfaces and interiors of these worlds, including cameras, spectrometers, and tools to precisely measure gravity.  One of these instruments that has special importance to the University of Arizona is the HiRISE camera, an imager that is the most powerful of its kind ever sent to another planet and operated from our own campus. 
 
I enjoy keeping a diverse set of scientific interests – there are far too many fascinating worlds in our solar system to pick just one! – but my research all falls under the theme of “planetary geophysics.”  I’ve studied ice volcanoes on Ceres, regular volcanoes on the Moon, glaciers on Mars, the interior of Mercury, and mysterious bright patches on the distant moons of Uranus.  Planetary science is a data-rich field with guarantees of major discovery that come with each successful NASA mission, and I can’t wait to see where our journey of exploration takes us next. 

Behavioral genetics is a growing field that seeks to explain how genes and neurons influence the behavior of an organism. Through a multi-disciplinary approach using genetic and neurobiological techniques, my ultimate research goal is to understand how organisms use their behavioral repertoire to enhance their survival, and to learn how these innate behaviors evolved.
 
For my graduate work, I focused on intraspecific aggressive behavior. Males of the same species will fight one another to compete over territory, food, and mates. This trait is found broadly across the animal kingdom, suggesting that it originated very early in the animal lineage and has been maintained and modified throughout evolution, but the underlying genetic factors remains unknown. We used the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, as a model organism due to the numerous genetic tools to alter genes or neuronal function. I found that co-housing aggressive males lead to an accumulation of physical damage to their wings and used this phenotype to perform the first mutagenesis screen for altered aggressive behavior, in which I identified two genes that were previously not associated with aggression. 
 
In my postdoctoral position here at the University of Arizona, I am branching out into the behavioral defenses of interspecific host-parasite interactions. Flies encounters numerous threats to its survival in the wild. One common threat is that from parasitoid wasps. These small insects inject a single egg into a fly larvae which, once hatched, develops within and ultimately consumes the host. However, flies have behavioral defenses to avoid infection from these wasps, and to cure themselves once infected. While adult female flies are not directly attacked by wasps, they do reduce the number of eggs they lay in the presence of wasps, which is thought to limit their offspring to wasp exposure. I am currently investigating the visual and olfactory systems to understand mechanistically how the fly senses the presence of these wasps. The ultimate goal is to identify the neuronal circuits from sensory inputs to behavioral outputs and understand how these circuits interact to regulate egg laying behavior in a complex environment.
 
In my time at the University of Arizona, I have been encouraged to pursue interdisciplinary research questions, not just from my advisor but across the entire campus. This is exemplified when my work on the olfactory system showed that flies not only respond to the presence of parasitoid wasps but also to other Hymenoptera insects such as ants. This lead to an unanticipated collaboration with Greg Chism from the Dornhaus lab to examine the evolutionary response to olfactory signals from the threats of other insects. Furthermore, I have worked closely with Dr. Diana Ferro of the Zarnescu lab to study altered innate behaviors in a fly model of frontotemporal dementia, resulting in a Center for Insect Science seed grant to advance our work. Finally, I have been awarded the BIO5 Postdoctoral Fellowship on my work of behavioral defenses against parasitoid wasps. These opportunities will allow me to broaden the scope of my research and mentor undergraduate students in the pursuit of obtaining a faculty position at a primarily undergraduate institution or a small liberal arts college where teaching and research experiences are passed down directly from professors to students.
 

As an animal behavior researcher, I am fascinated by the decision-making and problem-solving processes of other organisms and enjoy investigating what contributes to individual differences in these abilities. During my dissertation work, I became particularly interested in the early developmental factors that influence later temperament, cognition, and outcomes. Studying a population of guide dogs, I quantified the amount of maternal care that puppies received over the first few weeks of life and then tracked the puppies for two years. I found strong associations between the amount of mothering a puppy received and reactivity and problem-solving skills around 18 months of age. Moreover, mothering style was also associated with whether a puppy successfully graduated as a guide dog. Surprisingly, the dogs whose mothers were the most involved over those first few weeks of life were the least likely to graduate. While more research is needed, as is so often the case, one hypothesis is that a little bit of stress in early life is actually beneficial, and can build future resilience.

Since starting my postdoc position at the University of Arizona, I’ve been living at our lab’s “field site” in Northern California – Canine Companions for Independence (CCI). CCI is the largest non-profit provider of assistance dogs for people with disabilities in the United States. These dogs are expertly trained to offer physical and emotional support, providing their handlers with the freedom and self-confidence to navigate the world more independently. While being so far from campus can be challenging, living year-round at CCI has allowed for large amounts of data collection across many projects. In addition to banking biological samples for hormone analysis and recording observational videos of behavior, most of the data collection involves building a cognitive and behavioral phenotype of individual dogs through highly standardized experiments. In practice, this means that dogs spend a few fun and interactive hours with us, participating in voluntary food-finding games that allow us to quantify skills like memory, impulse control, problem solving, social acuity, and sensory discrimination.

Over the past year and a half, I have overseen the temperament and cognition testing of over 300 8-week old puppies, half of which have been re-tested as adults, as well as over 150 of their dams and sires. We plan to use these data to answer a variety of questions, ranging from how stable these behaviors are over time to how heritable these behaviors are across generations to how predictive they are of eventual outcome. One thing I love about this research is the potential for practical application of our findings. By investigating how the emergence of cognitive traits and early experiences with maternal style contribute to the best working dog phenotypes, one of the applied goals of my research is to help inform the allocation of resources and selection of breeding stock. Furthermore, by exploring questions like how dogs navigate space, control impulses, or categorize objects, I hope to help trainers develop techniques that take advantage of a dog’s natural abilities in applied settings. In these ways, I aim to finetune the efficiency of the process by which organizations breed, raise, and train future service dogs, thereby maximizing the impact for people with disabilities who receive these life-changing animals.

​The sky has always been a source of curiosity, astonishment, and mystery for the human being. From the very early ages, humans were mesmerized by its vastness and presence; the sky was everywhere, yet completely unreachable. Some put their mythological heroes and gods up in there, some got more curious and started to look for patterns, observe closely, and record the movements of the celestial objects to analyze what is this azure dome above us. Centuries later, now not only we have 10-meter-wide eyes (mirrors) monitoring the sky on every single clear night, but also we have sent telescopes into space looking for the furthest and earliest galaxies in the history of the universe!
 
As an astronomy postdoc at Steward Observatory and a NASA Hubble Fellow, I study early galaxies that were formed 10 billion years ago – only about 3 billion years after the Big Bang. The main questions that I try to address in my research are:  How do galaxies form and evolve throughout cosmic time? How does the stellar, gas, and dust content of galaxies evolve? How do early galaxies synthesis heavy elements and enrich their inter-stellar medium?
 
I use ground- and space-based telescopes to gather the light emitted from these galaxies, either in the form of taking images (photometry) or taking their spectra (spectrometry) in different filters. To fully understand the characteristics of a galaxy, one has to observe it in multiple wavelengths, as each component of a galaxy emits light in different wavelengths. For example, very hot, massive, young stars emit mostly in shorter wavelengths, i.e. ultraviolet, while older stars emit light mostly in the optical and near-infrared. My Ph.D. thesis and current research is mostly focused on combining the ultraviolet, optical, and infrared light of galaxies during the era of highest star formation activity in the universe, to study the galaxies’ physical characteristics, such as the rate of star formation, stellar mass, and chemical abundances. More specifically, I have recently focused on characterizing the properties of dust in early galaxies. Cosmic dust grains are solid particles with sizes of < 1 micron that exist in the inter-stellar medium inside galaxies. Dust grains absorb the optical and ultraviolet light emitted from stars and re-radiate the absorbed light at longer infrared wavelengths. Therefore, infrared emission from dust particles points to obscured stellar regions that we would otherwise miss. I use a wealth of data from various telescopes to measure the dust emission and absorption in distant galaxies and incorporate it with the unobscured ultraviolet and optical light to measure the total rate of star formation in galaxies.
 
I am also part of the science team of the NASA’s next decade space telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). JWST is a successor of the Hubble Space Telescope, which has a larger mirror, longer wavelength coverage, and greatly improved sensitivity compared to Hubble. With JWST we will be able to observe the first galaxies in the universe and look deep into the nearby dust clouds where stars and planets form. We expect JWST to launch in 2021.
 
Besides research and fulfilling our curiosity to know where we are from and where we are going, an exciting aspect of my job is to share the beauties of the sky with people and show them how amazing science is. Since undergraduate years, I have been an active science promoter. Currently, I am mostly involved in two outreach programs: the Staryab website as the co-founder, and the MESCIT mentorship program as the PI. Staryab (www.staryab.com) is a bi-weekly astrophysical literature journal in Persian, my native language, written by Iranian astronomers across the world since 2014. Our goal is to present interesting research papers in a brief and simple format that is understandable to Persian-speaking undergraduate students in the physical sciences and amateur astronomers who are interested in research. The Mentorship and Education for SCIence in Tucson (MESCIT; www.ireneshivaei.com/mescit), started in February 2018, is a mentorship and math tutoring program for the Native American students, focusing on the Ha:san Preparatory and Leadership school -- a bicultural public high school in Tucson, serving the Tohono O'odham youth and Native students. Our tutors, who are selected from the University of Arizona undergraduate students, visit the school on a weekly basis to tutor math in small classes of 2-3 students. We hope this connection serves to give the high school students someone they can contact for homework help, advice, and accountability.

Optical nanostructures can exhibit exceptional ability to control light, be used to achieve super-resolution imaging and an anomalously large photonic density of states. As a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Arizona, I work in the field of nano-optics and nanophotonics. In my career, I have acquired an experience in nanofabrication, optical characterization, and numerical modeling. I have studied switchable materials with low optical losses and using these materials, designed and fabricated nanophotonic waveguides with subwavelength mode confinement and long-range propagation. Recently, I developed a method to model and interpret experimental data obtained from near-field optical microscope using a scattering-type scanning of layered materials with resonant and non-resonant properties.
College of Optical Sciences provides unique opportunities for optics and photonics research spanning from fundamental optical physics to optical engineering, photonics, and image science with cutting-edge applications of optics in real systems. Building up on my expertise, I plan to lead a research program focusing on efficient light control and dynamic tuning that can be achieved using resonant nanostructures. Specific research interest lies in the development of hybrid metal-semiconductor designs with an emphasis on layered transition metal dichalcogenides, graphene, hexagonal boron nitride, their heterostructures, and other van der Waals materials. Exploring optical properties of novel materials with the aim to identify anisotropy, losses, etc., and furthermore, the utilization of these materials presents the possibility for photonic applications, including detectors, amplifiers, and heat transfers. The results will be paramount for the development of practical mid-infrared and terahertz ultra-compact devices for sensing and imaging.
Diversity is the key to innovation, growth, and success; teaching, and mentoring diverse groups is an important task. Despite efforts taken to increase diversity in science and related fields, many women and minorities still choose not to pursue these careers. I constantly seek to be involved in activities aimed at recruiting and supporting women and minorities through their study and work. I am actively involved in the initiatives taken by Women in Optics student club at the University of Arizona. We bring together female students, encourage development, and help them through their careers. It serves as a forum for women in the optical sciences community to communicate and exchange ideas, and we participate in outreach to teach optics and raise awareness of career opportunities.

​HIV rates along the U.S./Mexico border continues to rise despite public health interventions. Latinos in the United States are the only population experiencing an increase in HIV prevalence. As a postdoctoral research associate in the Division of Public Health Practice and Translational Science in the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health (MEZCOPH), I am working towards a better understanding of the driving forces influencing these HIV disease patterns. The goal of my investigation is to translate the empirical evidence generated by my research into public policies and interventions to curb HIV disparities experienced by Latinos. Broadly, my research seeks to disentangle the psychosocial factors of HIV vulnerability among Latino populations including immigration rhetoric, economic influences, and cultural expectations. Specifically, I test the utility of latent variable models to identify social phenomenon associated with HIV infections among (im)migrant Latino populations residing in high impact border regions to be translated into public policies and health interventions. 
 
As a Clinton Global Initiatives Fellow in Infectious Disease and Public Health, I am collaborating with colleagues from University of Southern California (USC) and the University of Arizona (UA) Juntos por la salud/Together for Health Mobile Clinic to collect exploratory data on the use of novel technological platforms for the collection of mental health data. The overarching goal of this study is to measure the associative relationship of mental health outcomes and the engagement in HIV risk behaviors among (im)migrant Latino populations in the U.S. The contributions of my scholarly work on health equity in the Latino community has been both internationally and nationally recognized, including being named as a 2017 Southern Arizona 40 Under 40 Rising Leader honoree. I aim to continue to engage in scholarship that contributes to the shaping of public policies for greater health equity. 

​My research interests broadly encompass investigating the impact of sleep and circadian rhythm disorders on health disparities in the US and Africa. As an epidemiologist and primary care physician specialized in sleep medicine I am bridging my clinical experience in sleep medicine with my research interests in health disparities and population health. My clinical background has focused on serving medically neglected populations in the US and West Africa, while my research background has concentrated on investigating the role of sleep in health disparities among people of African ancestry in both the US and West Africa.  It is my objective to help uncover explanations for the racial/ethnic disparities in sleep disorders, the physiological and/or genetic mechanism(s) by which they occur and solutions or interventions to significantly minimize or eliminate these disparities.
 
Since, becoming a PERT Scholar at the University of Arizona I have focused my current research on investigating the role of genetics in the relationship between sleep and depression in people of African ancestry. We have identified a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of an important enzyme involved in the synthesis of melatonin that also happens to be strongly associated with depression and highly prevalent in people of African ancestry. The objective of this research is to investigate the role of circadian phase delay on the relationship between carriers of this SNP and depression. I have the privilege of collaborating with the H-3 Africa research network giving me access to data collected from a large prospective cohort in Ghana and Nigeria.
 
The future directions of my research are to further expand the collection of objective and subjective sleep data to other H-3 Africa sites in East, Central, and Southern Africa forming the largest repository of sleep data in Africa. With this data I plan on analyzing the impact of sleep culture, quality, and duration on non-communicable diseases in Africa. Additionally, understanding how the environment and migration impact the sleep of people of African ancestry, potentially contributing to health disparities in the US, is of particular interest to my work. Fundamentally, It is my goal to contribute to the understanding of the role of sleep in global health disparities; hopefully impacting social-environmental policies that inform and inspire development capable of improving the health of entire populations. 

​My research focuses on the variability and long-term controls on regional rainfall. I use chemical and biological traces left by past climates, called proxies, to understand how regional hydroclimate changed in the past. I use these measurements to ‘benchmark’ climate model simulations and identify the specific physical mechanisms behind particular past climate changes.

My dissertation focused on improving understanding of droughts in the last 2000 years in Mesoamerica. I studied lakes in the mountains of Central Mexico that contain high-resolution sedimentary archives, and used ancient pollen, sediment chemistry and the isotopic composition of authigenic calcite to reconstruct past droughts. This work was instrumental in identifying relationships between climate and pre-Columbian societal changes as well as shedding light on the linkages between local Mesoamerican drought and the larger climate system.

​As a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Arizona, I am expanding my ‘toolkit’ for studying past climates by utilizing organic geochemical techniques to reconstruct the history of the North American Monsoon (NAM) since the last Ice Age (last Glacial Maximum, ~21 ka BP). The NAM is critical to regional hydrology in the Southwest, but is one of the least understood monsoon systems. Our measurements of the isotopic composition of ancient leaf waxes are providing exciting insights into its long-term variability. We are also exploring the fundamental mechanisms that produce the NAM and other monsoon circulations using idealized climate model simulations.

As a postdoctoral research associate at the Center for Digital Society and Data Studies, I am studying the implications of technology on civil society and democracy.  In particular, I am studying political expression under surveillance and attitudes about privacy.  As a postdoctoral scholar, I'm working through three main challenges: I am working on developing a scholarly identity in an emerging, interdisciplinary field, learning how to develop projects of the right size, and orienting myself at the University of Arizona.

First, studying "digital society" as a "data scientist" means that every person I meet asks what that means, and my answers evolve as I figure it out myself.  I am working with a wonderful multi-disciplinary group of scholars, including Drs. Catherine Brooks and Yotam Shmargad of the School of Information and Dr. Samara Klar at the School of Government and Public Policy.  I believe that working across disciplines is a stimulating--and increasingly necessary--process, especially in evolving areas of study, including how people behave online.  From an interdisciplinary major as an undergraduate (Ethics, Politics & Economics) to a Ph.D. in Education, focused on the Economics of Education, I have developed skills in quantitative social science, particularly statistical and econometric methods for causal inference and randomized experiments.  These skills--focused on proving that one factor can be causally linked to another--are very nicely informed by other processes of meaning-making (including historical and qualitative inquiry) and other quantitative findings (including associations unearthed by machine learning and carefully crafted measures from sociology and psychology), which makes multidisciplinary collaborations that much more valuable.  My dissertation used descriptive and experimental methods to understand how participants interacted in three-month-long Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) for teacher professional development.  In crossing disciplinary divides, I find that normative ideals are one of the best constants to start from:  I believe that the process of exchanging ideas can improve learning, cooperation, civil society, and democracy, and I want to build our knowledge of how that can happen.

Second, as a postdoc I am learning how to develop new projects that are the right scope.  About a week after I began here, I began working on a proposal for a software platform that could revolutionize certain kinds of research.  While developing this idea with my mentors and several others, however, we found that this should be something that we might build up to later.  (A wise aphorism, "The perfect is the enemy of the good," comes to mind here.)  Since then, I have learned a lot about taking smaller incremental steps.  One of my current research projects involves how students think about educational data and what their privacy concerns may be.  Another project, withmy fellow post-doc Dr. Volodymyr Lysenko, concerns how disinformation is spread online during elections.  I am also learning more about how people choose what political and self-expressive information to disclose to others, as related to the literatures on communication, the spread of information through social networks, political opinion, and concern for privacy;  this is leading to surveys and behavioral experiments to better understand interpersonal behavior in social media and elsewhere online.  I am also very interested in Internet behavior that is heterogeneous by social group, particularly when this leads to blindness or bias; I got a chance to write about this in the New York Times' Room for Debate when I first started here.

Third, I am learning my way around the University of Arizona.  Being on the University of Arizona Postdoc mailing list has been helpful in that, as has been the Writing Accountability Group I joined through that.  I'm auditing a class with Dr. Jenny Hoit, "Survival Skills and Ethics," which is filling in some gaps from grad school and advancing me toward a NSF Responsible Conduct of Research certificate. Looking around for on-campus arts events has helped me see fun concerts like HarpFusion and the Faculty/Staff Choir and eagerly await the musicals Evita and In the Heights.  Events like Tucson Meet Yourself (October), the All Souls Procession (early November), and Tucson Festival of Books(looking forward to it in March!) are helping me learn about my new city.


I hope that 2017 allows us all to tackle tough challenges, recognize as we make progress, and maintain our focus on and hope for a better future.