Dr. Kevin Gurney and Pawlok Dass, have been exploring the relationship between new data on daily traffic and the number of COVID-19 cases in the United States. The analysis shows that prior to the end of March, U.S. traffic activity—a useful proxy for a return to pre-COVID economic activity—declined rapidly as the number of COVID-19 cases increased. However, since that time, traffic activity and COVID-19 cases have been exhibiting strong regional patterns, with states such as California and Texas… Read more
NAU-SICCS launches Professional Community on LinkedIn
SICCS community, welcome! I’m the current Director of the school, Ben Ruddell. Please reach out to me personally if you’d like to talk about the school. We’re aggressively seeking partners with companies, alumni, and especially anyone who wants to discuss internships, scholarships, and co-op programs. We’re also looking for industry and advisory board members who want to help us create a positive impact on our community.
Also, please share this group with everyone you know who is related to… Read more
Dr. Fatemeh Afghah receives a CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation
Congratulations to Associate Professor and Director of Wireless Networking and Information Processing(WiNIP) Lab , Dr. Fatemeh Afghah on receiving a $541,949 CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation. This is a prestigious grant, also known as the Faculty Early Career Development program. The program seeks to support early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education, and to lead advances in the mission of… Read more
Forests can be risky climate investments to offset greenhouse gas emissions, say NAU scientists
Professor Scott Goetz of Northern Arizona University’s School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems and associate professor Deborah Huntzinger of NAU’s School of Earth and Sustainability co-authored a paper published in Science finding that forests can be best deployed in the fight against climate change with a proper understanding of the risks to forests that climate change itself imposes. Given the tremendous ability of forests to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, some governments are counting on… Read more
NAU researchers testing northern Arizona wastewater for early warning of COVID-19 outbreaks
With the ongoing challenges associated with large-scale testing for COVID-19—including test kit shortages, stringent testing criteria and the inherent limitations of current tracking systems on mildly symptomatic and asymptomatic populations, scientists are looking for alternate methods to boost testing in order to predict the spread of the disease. Crystal Hepp, an assistant professor in NAU’s School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems (SICCS), is testing wastewater in northern Arizona communities to help… Read more
NAU scientists develop interactive disease models to predict spread of COVID-19 across northern Arizona
Joe Mihaljevic, a mathematical epidemiologist and assistant professor in Northern Arizona University’s School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems (SICCS), is leading a new project to create computer modeling systems to predict outcomes of the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, across four northern Arizona counties—Coconino, Navajo, Apache and Mohave. Read more