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Prof. Robyn Millan will head a nationwide team working to study Earth’s magnetosphere.
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Dartmouth this year welcomed 30 new tenured and tenure-track scholars to the ranks of its general faculty—specialists in fields ranging from history, the philosophy of language, and the economics of housing and transportation to biomedical engineering, virology, evolutionary ecology, robotics, and data science.
“This cohort of faculty represents some of the most innovative and promising thinkers in their respective disciplines,” says President Sian Leah Beilock. “They are committed to bringing those talents to teaching and will also impact scholarship in fields ranging from health care policy to large-language models to philosophy to renewable energy systems. I am proud to welcome them to the Dartmouth community.”
The faculty hold appointments throughout the institution, including in the School of Arts and Sciences, the Geisel School of Medicine, Thayer School of Engineering, Tuck School of Business, and Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies.
Valentina Apresyan
Associate Professor of East European, Eurasian, and Russian Studies
Education: BA, Moscow State University | MA, University of Southern California | PhD, University of Southern California | Dr Habil, Institute of Russian Language
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I study how language reflects our patterns of attention, thought and feeling, and how it can, in turn, be used to manipulate our attention or evoke certain feelings and reactions. My recent work explores cross-cultural responses to clickbait headlines. My current project focuses on moral emotions—shame, guilt, conscience, honor—across several languages and cultures. I am also interested in language acquisition and contact, and how speaking one language affects our performance in another.
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am an industrial organization economist focused on housing and transportation markets. My research combines large-scale data, empirical methods, and economic theory to understand how large firms affect these markets, and how to design optimal policies that benefit consumers. In particular, I study how institutional landlords affect housing prices and supply, how to design rental assistance policies to prevent homelessness, and how cities should set public transit prices in tandem with congestion pricing to improve urban welfare.
Bryan Bollinger ’03, Thayer ’03
Professor of Marketing and Economic Policy
Education: AB, Dartmouth College | BE, Thayer School of Engineering | MA, Stanford University | PhD, Stanford Graduate School of Business
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I study empirical questions that lie at the intersection of marketing and economic policy, drawing upon tools from business, economics, psychology, and data science. Some examples include drivers of renewable energy diffusion, the role of home automation, and consumer response to health information. I am currently studying the impact of tariffs on the U.S. solar market, sustainability labels on consumer loyalty, and the ability of artificial intelligence to increase patient access and engagement in health care.
Keng-Chi Chang
Assistant Professor of Quantitative Social Science
Education: BA, National Taiwan University | MS, University of California San Diego | PhD, University of California San Diego
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I use computational tools, including AI and large language models, to study how technology and media influence politics. My work explores censorship circumvention, online image-sharing behaviors, and the recommendation of short-form video content by algorithms. I’m fascinated by how our digital world is reshaping democracy and the possibilities—and risks—it creates for political and social life.
Cong Chen
Assistant Professor of Engineering
Education: BE, Wuhan University | MS, Tsinghua University | PhD, Cornell University | Postdoc, Stanford University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research focuses on advancing the global energy transition through optimization, economics, and modern machine learning/AI principles. I have research experience in large-scale distributed energy resource aggregation, pricing under uncertainties, energy storage integration in the electricity market, behavioral generative agents for energy operations, and hydrogen storage for grid resilience.
Sandhya Dirks
Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing
Education: BA, Mills College | MS, Columbia University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I’m a journalist and former NPR correspondent covering race and identity with a focus on reporting through the lens of systems of power. I’ve investigated police misconduct and chronicled social justice movements. I’ve been reporting on our country’s crisis of grief and examining how a politics of power and domination has found purchase in some communities of color. I’m currently focusing on the push to undo civil rights, investigating how civil rights law and language have been captured and co-opted in order to end civil rights entirely.
Bryce Ferguson
Assistant Professor of Engineering
Education: AA, Santa Rosa Junior College | BS, University of California, Santa Barbara | MS, University of California, Santa Barbara | PhD, University of California, Santa Barbara
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research focuses on the control and automation of large-scale systems with many interconnected devices and/or many human users (often termed multi-agent systems). I work to provide answers to emerging questions facing engineers, such as “How should multiple autonomous systems interact?” and “How should systems adapt to collective human behavior?” By developing fundamental analysis and deployable algorithms, my research provides relevant insights into many application areas, including critical infrastructure, robotics, security, and the environment.
Rebecca Gallivan
Assistant Professor of Engineering
Education: BS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology | MS, California Institute of Technology | PhD, California Institute of Technology
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research focuses on understanding micro- and nano-scale material design from processing to performance. Building from this, my group will work to uncover the foundational principles behind complex nanostructural materials engineering. I am particularly interested in developing new techniques for nanoscale manufacturing (like nanoscale 3D printing) and am excited to tackle how these advances can be made while still addressing sustainability concerns, such as energy consumption in manufacturing, rare/scarce material needs, toxicity, and waste.
Felicia Goodrum
Professor of Microbiology and Immunology
Education: BS, Virginia Tech | PhD, Wake Forest University | Postdoc, Princeton University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am a molecular virologist, and my research focuses on how human cytomegalovirus, a ubiquitous herpesvirus, persists indefinitely (in part through a latent infection and in part due to chronic shedding) following its infection. Our work intersects with many aspects of host cell biology that are important for viral latency. This includes the way cells transmit signals, control their gene expression and differentiation, and fend off pathogenic invaders. As one of the viruses that have co-evolved with humans the longest, studying cytomegalovirus teaches us much about our own biology and how viruses and their hosts engage to establish infection, transmit progeny virus and cause disease—or not.
Subha Guha
Professor of Biomedical Data Science
MSc, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur | PhD, The Ohio State University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My work sits at the intersection of statistics, biomedical data science, and cancer research. I develop methods for integrating high-dimensional cancer data across studies and omics platforms, focusing on causal inference and precision oncology. These approaches improve cancer risk prediction, treatment modeling, and biomarker discovery. I am particularly interested in Bayesian methods, clustering, and machine learning, and in translating statistical innovations into real-world impact through collaborations with biomedical researchers and clinicians.
Samia Hesni
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Education: BA, Amherst College | MA, Tufts University | PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I work in philosophy of language, feminist philosophy, and social and political philosophy. I am increasingly thinking about philosophy of film, philosophy of psychology, cognitive science, queer theory, and the places where those areas overlap.
Nianqiao (Phyllis) Ju
Assistant Professor of Mathematics
Education: BA, Wellesley College | PhD, Harvard University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
As a statistician, I study how to extract insights from data in an effective and reliable way. I specialize in Bayesian and computational statistics, with an emphasis on provably fast, scalable, and robust methods. My current projects address emerging challenges in statistical inference under data privacy constraints.
Emily Lacroix ’15
Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences
Education: AB, Dartmouth College | PhD, Stanford University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am a mechanism-focused, “big-picture”-motivated soil biogeochemist. My work connects microscale processes to field-scale measures in both managed and unmanaged ecosystems. Through studying soil biogeochemical processes and their spatiotemporal heterogeneity, I hope to improve predictions of greenhouse gas, nutrient, and contaminant mobilization after human-induced disturbance. Right now, I am particularly interested in how oxygen heterogeneity and root-soil interactions alter the fate of soil organic carbon, nutrients, and contaminants.
JoAnna Leyenaar
Professor and Paul Batalden Chair for Clinical Improvement and Professional Development
Education: BSc, University of Guelph | MD, McMaster University School of Medicine | MPH, Harvard School of Public Health | PhD, Tufts University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My work focuses on improving health care quality for children and adolescents, particularly those who are most underserved. My current projects, funded by the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute, the National Institute of Nursing Research, the National Institute of Mental Health, and the National Institute on Drug Abuse, focus on participatory qualitative research methods, improving mental and behavioral health care delivery in acute care settings, and long-term outcomes among opioid-exposed infants.
Chen Liao
Assistant Professor of Microbiology and Immunology
Education: BS, University of Science and Technology of China | PhD, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I combine computational modeling, experimental microbiology, and clinical data analysis to study microbial metabolism in the human gut microbiome. My lab develops fluxomics platforms for individual microbes and communities and investigates metabolite-mediated interactions between gut microbes and their host. I work closely with wet lab scientists and am eager to build new collaborations at Dartmouth.
Abhishek Mallick
Assistant Professor of Mathematics
Education: BSc, Ramakrishna Mission Vidyamandira | MSc, RKMVERI | PhD, Michigan State University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research explores the geometry and topology of the mysterious four-dimensional space, which is uniquely positioned between the familiar three-dimensional world and the higher dimensions. This makes four dimensions especially intriguing, as it hosts exotic geometric phenomena unseen in any other dimension. I employ mathematical tools from gauge theory and symplectic geometry to investigate longstanding open problems and conjectures about four-dimensional shapes. Some of these questions have remained unsolved for over 100 years.
Bijan Mazaheri
Assistant Professor of Engineering
Education: BA, Williams College | PhD, California Institute of Technology
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am interested in a variety of topics within causality and information theory. I aim to make AI more adaptable to scientific problems by studying the mathematics of combining information from multiple places, studies, and modalities.
Jessie Mutz
Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences
Education: BA, University of Florida | PhD, Florida State University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am an evolutionary ecologist interested in how plants interact with other organisms, particularly herbivorous insects and belowground fungi. I study feedbacks that arise between traits of individuals (e.g., defenses, movement) and characteristics of populations (e.g., density, demographic structure), and ultimately the role these feedbacks play in driving ecological and evolutionary dynamics in natural systems. To do this, I integrate field studies, lab and greenhouse experiments, and mathematical models.
Mimi Thi Nguyen
Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
Education: BA, University of California, Berkeley | MA, New York University | PhD, University of California, Berkeley
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My training in transnational feminist cultural studies is as a method for yielding insights about historico-philosophical concepts and ontological distinctions of the human through specific studies—for instance, of liberalism, aesthetics, empire, and war and other forms of political violence. Through such inquiry, the traffic in ideas, concepts, or social goods including freedom, beauty, sovereignty, and community, are interrogated not as unambiguous values but as transnational and transactional categories. Thus, the central query guiding my own approach to is: How do claims about gender, sexuality, and racialization—each intimate with other schema of difference—delineate what forms of life and for life are valuable and which are not, and how do these claims act upon the historical present to imagine or build another future?
Dawit Petros
Associate Professor of Studio Art
Education: BA, University of Saskatchewan | BFA, Concordia University | MFA, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston & Tufts University | Independent Study Program, Whitney Museum
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I work across photography, sculpture, video, sound, and performance to probe the layered histories of colonialism, modernity, and media. My research explores how historical events endure in their material remnants and political afterlives. By engaging multiple forms and sites of production, I aim to reveal the instability and generative potential of these histories as they shape contemporary experience.
Brian Plancher
Assistant Professor of Computer Science
Education: BA, Harvard University | MEng, Harvard University | PhD, Harvard University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research is focused on optimizing robotic systems at all scales by developing, optimizing, implementing, and evaluating next-generation algorithms and edge computational systems, through algorithm-hardware-software co-design. I also want to promote a responsible, sustainable, and accessible future for robotics and edge computing, including the development of new interdisciplinary, project-based, open-access courses that lower the barriers to entry for cutting-edge topics like robotics, parallel programming, and embedded machine learning.
Emily Presseller
Assistant Professor of Biomedical Data Science
Education: BA, Johns Hopkins University | MS, Drexel University | PhD, Drexel University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research combines computational modeling and ecological data to understand maintenance of psychological symptoms across time and develop digital health interventions to extend reach of traditional psychological treatments. I am especially interested in applying ecological momentary assessment (real-time smartphone surveys) and sensor technologies to develop predictive models for eating disorder symptoms, which can then be used to deliver just-in-time adaptive interventions targeting these symptoms. I also study between- and within-person heterogeneity in psychological presentations.
Chengxiang Qiu
Assistant Professor of Molecular and Systems Biology
Education: BS, BeiHang University | MS, Peking University | PhD, University of Washington
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My lab uses computational approaches to analyze large-scale genetic and molecular datasets and uncover how gene regulation controls cell differentiation and lineage commitment in mammalian development. We focus on mapping cellular trajectories and transcription factor networks to understand normal development and Mendelian disorders. By integrating cross-species models and humanized atlases, we aim to reveal core principles of developmental diseases and drive innovative therapies through synthetic biology and cell engineering.
Anthony Rizzo
Assistant Professor of Engineering
Education: BS, Haverford College | MS, Columbia University | MPhil, Columbia University | PhD, Columbia University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My research interests are in the development and application of photonic integrated circuits across various domains including computing, communications, and sensing. These photonic circuits, fabricated on the same silicon chips used for electronics, use light rather than electricity to process information and thus enable a dramatic reduction in energy consumption relative to incumbent technologies. My group is working to develop the next-generation of photonic chips for applications in quantum computing, data center interconnects, and biosensing.
Sarah Robertson
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology
Education: BS, University of Massachusetts Amherst | MS, Brown University | PhD, Brown University
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(Photo by Rob Strong ’04)
My research focuses on developing and applying causal inference methods from diverse data sources to tailor screening strategies and improve the evidence base in specific populations. My work in this area is supported by a National Cancer Institute K99/R00 award investigating the effectiveness of lung cancer screening in real-world target populations.
Keidrick Roy
Assistant Professor of Government
Education: BS, United States Air Force Academy | MA, University of Arizona | PhD, Harvard University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
As a political theorist, I trace the development of foundational concepts such as liberalism, nationalism, and conservatism in U.S. political thought since the Revolutionary Era. My research also draws on African American intellectual traditions to rethink current debates. My first book, American Dark Age (2024), explored enduring medievalisms that haunt U.S. democratic ideals, and my forthcoming one reinterprets “the Enlightenment” through the eyes of early Black Americans. Before academia, I was a military nuclear operations officer.
Tara Suri
Assistant Professor of History
Education: AB, Harvard College | MPhil, University of Cambridge | PhD, Princeton University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am a historian of science and society in modern South Asia. My work draws together histories of medicine and health; histories of decolonization and the Cold War; and histories of race, gender, caste, and the body. I am currently working on a book about South Asia’s global biomedical trade in rhesus monkeys.
Arianna Varuolo-Clarke
Assistant Professor of Geography
Education: BS, Vermont State University, Lyndon | MS, Stony Brook University | PhD, Columbia University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I am an atmospheric scientist studying precipitation variability—past and present—to improve projections of future changes. My research investigates the relative contributions of human activities and natural climate variability to historical precipitation trends. By deepening our understanding of the historical record, we gain valuable insights into what future precipitation patterns may look like. Much of my research is done by comparing observations to output from Earth system models.
Guanbo Wang
Assistant Professor of Health Policy and Clinical Practice
Education: MSc, McGill University | PhD, McGill University
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
I specialize in biostatistics, focusing on the development and application of causal inference methods. My work integrates evidence from real-world data and clinical trials, aiming to advance statistical and epidemiological methodologies in personalized medicine and clinical research.
Junbo Zhao
Todd M. Cook and Elizabeth Donohoe Cook Associate Professor of Engineering
Education: BS, Southwest Jiaotong University | PhD, Virginia Tech
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(Photo by Katie Lenhart)
My mission is to develop the next generation of cyber-physical intelligence to advance electric grid digitalization, electrification, and decarbonization. I pursue this goal through close collaborations with partner universities, the power industry, and national laboratories. My research focuses on power and energy system modeling and monitoring, renewable energy integration, reliability and resilience, data analytics, dynamics and stability control, and cybersecurity. I am currently the director of DOE Northeast University Cybersecurity Center for Advanced and Resilient Energy Delivery (CyberCARED) and a research scientist at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
