Farboud Khatami is a PhD candidate in water resources at the University of South Carolina. His current research revolves around Food-Energy-Water Nexus in the state of South Carolina. Farboud’s areas of expertise include water resources management, environmental engineering, environmental economics, and computer programming. After graduating from a NODET school in Tehran, he earned his BS from Shahid Beheshti University and his MS from Sharif University of Technology. He also considers himself a free software advocate and uses free “as in freedom” software whenever possible. When he is not working on his research projects, Farboud usually reads books, watches old movies, or plays computer games.
Mohammad Erfani is a graduate research assistant in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of South Carolina. He graduated with a MSc in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran. He joined iWERS as a PhD student in August 2019. Currently he is working on applying Artificial Intelligence, specifically Convolutional Neural Networks to real-time flood mapping and early warning systems.
Ahad Hasan Tanim joins the team as a PhD candidate in water resources. His current research revolves around compound flood modeling and coastal problems in the eastern coast of US. Ahad’s areas of expertise include numerical modeling, GIS, coastal management and computer programming. He earned his BSc. and MSc. from CUET, Bangladesh.
Mahdi Erfani is a Ph.D. candidate in water resources. He has recently joined Dr. Goharian's team and is currently working on using decision trees for reservoir operation optimization. He has earned his BS in civil engineering and his MS in water resources engineering from IUST. His research interests include water resources systems modeling and optimization and water resource economics.
Carly Lawyer, previously a research assistant for Dr. Goharian, rejoins the iWERS team as a master’s student at the University of South Carolina where she also earned her BS. With a water resources focus, her current research involves utilizing GIS to assess stormwater management pond vulnerability to both extreme storm events and sea level rise scenarios in coastal areas of South Carolina.
Rachel Dickson is enrolled in the APOGEE ME program at the University of South Carolina, with a focus in Water Resource Engineering. Meanwhile, she is working full time as a Digital Terrain Modeler for a Maryland based company called Triangle Contracting LLC. Triangle Contracting specializes in storm water management and stream restoration, which has inspired her to pursue further education in this field. In 2016, she graduated from North Carolina State University with BS in Meteorology and a minor in Geology. Although she is not currently involved in any iWERS research projects, she hopes to provide the team with insight into real-world water resource problems and assist with small projects in the future.
Luis Baez, graduated in Computer Science at the University of South Carolina in May 2021. He enrolled in the Accelerated Master's Degree in Computer Science to achieve an MS in Computer Science in May of 2022. He has served as the President of the Cyber Security Student Organization. His interests include Secure Software Development, Mobile and Web Application Development, and Computer Systems Engineering.
Ashlin Gibson is an undergraduate student at the University of South Carolina currently pursuing her BS in Civil Engineering. Ashlin joined the iWERS team to work as a research assistant who would help annotate photos in order to help develop a responsive neural network that can be used as an early warning system for flood detection.
Nathaniel Joly is an undergraduate student at the University of South Carolina currently pursuing his BS in Civil Engineering and his BS in Real Estate Finance. Nathaniel joined the iWERS team to work as a research assistant who would help gather and analyze data to help create a vulnerability index for coastal communities.
Nathan Gates joined the iWERS team from 2019 to 2020 as an undergraduate research assistant and worked towards his BS in Civil Engineering from the University of South Carolina. With previous experience in Deep Learning, he assisted with developing a photo recognition software for water resources applications. Nathan now works at Nucor Building Systems.
Harshith Reddy was a Master's student in Computer Science at the University of South Carolina. He earned his Bachelor's degree from Osmania University, India. Harshith helped iWERS by working on image processing and computer vision models for flood detection. He now works at Medpace in Cincinnati.
Harold Pollard was an undergraduate student at the University of South Carolina pursuing his BS in Civil Engineering. Harold joined the iWERS team to work as a research assistant who would aid in developing a responsive neural network that could recognize photographs and their components for water resource purposes through the creation of a breadth of annotated images to teach the network. Harold also assisted in formulating guidelines for image annotation.
Ammar Dossaji is an undergraduate student at the University of South Carolina currently pursuing his BS in Civil Engineering. Ammar joined the iWERS team to work as an assistant who would help the team annotate and select photos that would develop a responsive neural network that can recognize photos involving water resources and flood awareness. Ammar is also active on the South Carolina ultimate frisbee club team.
Joshua Coleman is an undergraduate student at the University of South Carolina currently pursuing his BS in Civil Engineering. Joshua joined the iWERS team to work as an assistant who would help the team annotate and select photos that would develop a responsive neural network that can recognize photos and their components to be used for water resource purposes.
