Pedram Safari

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Background

Affiliations

• Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Visiting Scholar/Lecturer, 2007–2008; Preceptor, 2008–2016; Research Associate, 2016–2019.
• The Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Visiting Scholar & Fellow, Dec 2015–2019.
• The Abdus Salam ICTP, Trieste, Italy. Visiting Fellow, 2004–05.
• Institute for Studies in Theoretical Physics and Mathematics (IPM), Tehran, Iran. Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Fall 2001–Summer 2004.
• Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran. Assistant Professor, 2000–2001.
• Columbia University, New York. Departmental Representative, Summers of 1999 and 2000; Preceptor, 1999–2000.

Education

• Columbia University, New York, NY; Ph.D. in Mathematics, May 2000.
• Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran; B.S. in Mathematics, summa cum laude, June 1993.

Research

Interests. Geometry and topology in low dimensions, gauge theory, dynamical systems, interdisciplinary applications of mathematics in other fields

Selected Bibliography

• “Future Exchange Rates and Siegel's Paradox”, with Keivan Mallahi-Karai, Global Finance Journal, vol. 37 (Aug. 2018), 168-172.
  arXiv:1805.03347 [q-fin.MF], ssrn:2892161, doi: 10.1016/j.gfj.2018.04.007.
• “Spatial remapping without gain fields: a neural model based on cortico-thalamic connectivity”, joint poster with Baktash Babadi, Nan Jia and Arash Yazdanbakhsh at the 36th European Conference on Visual Perception, August 27, 2013, Bremen, Germany.
• “Gluing Seiberg-Witten Moduli Spaces”, mathematical monograph, Lambert Academic Publishing, 2010. ISBN: 978-3-8383-2763-1.
• “Gluing Seiberg-Witten Monopoles”, Comm. An. Geom, vol. 13, no. 4 (Oct. 2005), 697-725.
  arXiv:math/0311329 [math.DG], doi: 10.4310/CAG.2005.v13.n4.a3.
• “e-Publishing” (in Persian), Nashr-e Riyazi 26, vol. 14, no. 1 (2003), 17-34.
• “What is Seiberg-Witten theory?” (expository article in Persian), Nashr-e Riyazi 23, vol. 12, no. 1-2 (2001), 4-11.
• “A gluing theorem for Seiberg-Witten moduli spaces”, Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 2000.

Selected Presentations

• "Seiberg-Witten Equations with Multiple Spinors", Algebra/Topology Seminar, Department of Mathematics, SUNY at Albany, NY; August 28, 2014.
• "Seiberg-Witten monopoles and 4-manifold surgery", Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Department of Mathematics, Cal Tech, Pasadena, CA; May 5, 2008.
• "Gluing Monopoles", Differential Geometry and Geometric Analysis Seminar, Department of Mathematics, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ; December 7, 2007.
• "Gluing Seiberg-Witten Monopoles: an outline", Gauge Theory and Topology Seminar, Department of Mathematics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA; March 23, 2007.
• "Gluing Seiberg-Witten Monopoles", Fakultät für Mathematik, Universität Bielefeld, Bielefeld, Germany; November 18, 2005.
• "Gluing Seiberg-Witten Monopoles: a mathematical approach", the Abdus Salam ICTP, Trieste, Italy; March 31, 2004.
• "Floer Homology and Novikov Rings", Columbia Gauge Theory Seminar, June 1997.
• "Complex Analysis: The Geometric Viewpoint", Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, 1993.
  This was a series of lectures (jointly with Saeed Zakeri), following a book by S. Krantz of the same title.
• "Perturbations of Hamiltonian Systems and Abelian Integrals", Dynamical Systems Seminar, Sharif University of Technology, 1992.
• "Linear Flows in the Complex Domain", weekly colloquium, Sharif University of Technology, 1991.

Teaching

Curriculum Development
As a preceptor in mathematics, I developed a mathematical curriculum for students in social sciences, acting as a liaison between various schools and departments across the university, including public health, education, psychology, statistics, mathematics and government. This curriculum consisted of several components:

• Course development: (Basic/Intermediate) Mathematics for Social Scientists, a sequence of two courses, spanning a full academic year;
• Mentoring or advising graduate students of social sciences in the mathematical aspects of their projects and theses, on topics such as

  Fourier transforms, Calculus of variations, Equilibriums in game theory, Itō's lemma in stochastic processes and Black–Scholes equation, Logistic Normal Topic model, Currency exchange in political economy, Diffusion Tensor Imaging, Social Choice theory;

• Developing and organizing workshops on advanced or specialized topics that did not normally require a whole course on their own. These mini-courses I designed addressed various topics of interest, such as

  Fair division, Voting theory, Markov chains, Network theory, Dynamical systems, Fixed point theorems (with an eye to game theory and social choice theory), Principal Component Analysis, etc.

Thesis Supervision

  2. Amin Gholampour, Symplectic Thom Conjecture, a review of the work of Szabó and Ozsváth, M.S. thesis, Sharif University, July 2002.
  1. Seyyed Mohsen Khalkhali, Finslerian Geometry as a Generalization of Riemannian Geometry, M.S. thesis, Sharif University, Oct. 2001.

Courses
Range from elementary college courses as Pre-Calculus, College Algebra and Trigonometry, Linear Algebra, Calculus sequence, Introduction to Modern Analysis, and Elementary Differential Topology, to more advanced gradaute courses as Geometry of Manifolds II, Topics in the Geometry of Manifolds and Introduction to Seiberg-Witten theory....

Honors
Harvard University Certificate of Teaching Excellence, awarded by the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, Fall 2014.

Professional

Selected Activities

• Member of the Editorial Board of Nashr-e Riazi, an expositoray math journal in Persian. Tehran, 2002-2005.
• Reviewer for the Mathematical Reviews, since January 15, 2004.
• Member of the Scientific Committee of the 2nd Iranian Geometry-Topology Conference. Amir-Kabir University , Tehran, Feb. 3–5, 2003.
• Co-editor of Shahyad, a festschrift in honor of S. Shahshahani's 60th birthday, May 31, 2002.
• Providing Persian sub-titles for the movie Dimensions (jointly with Leila Khatami).
  This movie is a mathematical exposition for the general public, produced with an international collaboration and translated to over 19 languages in its upcoming edition.

Computer Skills

• Well acquainted with Mac, UNIX and Windows operating systems, and setting up servers.
• Proficiency in LaTeX, Mathematica, MS Word, Excel, Emacs and Xfig.
• Familiarity with various Adobe and Macromedia softwares or iOS applications.
• Rudiments of algorithmic and object-oriented programming.

Languages

Persian (native), English (fluent), French (good; DELF: A2), Italian (fair), Arabic (good in reading), German (fair in reading), HTML (good), Java (fair).

References

• Clifford Taubes, William Petschek Professor of Mathematics, Harvard University
• Cumrun Vafa, Donner Professor of Science, Department of Physics, Harvard University
• John Willett, Charles William Eliot Research Professor of Education, Harvard University (teaching)
• Gary King, Director, Institute for Quantitative Social Science and Albert J Weatherhead III University Professor, Department of Government, Harvard University (teaching & professional)
• John Morgan, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, Columbia University; Founding Director, Simons Center for Geometry and Physics, Stony Brook University
• Siavash Shahshahani, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, Sharif University and Founding Fellow of IPM, Tehran, Iran