Zohreh Doborjeh
Outstanding Doctoral Award Recipient
School of Engineering, Computer and Mathematical Sciences
Faculty of Design and Creative Technologies
Over the last four years, Zohreh Doborjeh has contributed significantly to research at AUT, and has been valued and acknowledged by experts in the field of computational cognitive neuroscience. She has raised her national and international profile, resulting in her inclusion as an emerging researcher in the last Performance-Based Research Fund (PBRF).
She also received the Dean’s Award of Excellence, three Best International Paper Awards at AUT, and was nominated for best PhD thesis externally by the International Neural Network Society. Zohreh’s excellent research resulted in 25 publications in reputable journals and conferences. Her unique expertise, along with her innovative work make her a valuable asset for the future of science and research in New Zealand.
To her long list of achievements she can now add the Outstanding Doctoral Award, which she has received for her research in the interdisciplinary area of neuroinformatics, brain data analysis and neuroscience. “I believe the achievement of this prestigious award will make a huge impact on my future academic career, this will indeed reinforce my competences, performance, contribution to science, and boost my dedication.”
Zohreh says she enjoyed studying and working at AUT, and it has been a great experience for her because “AUT is an aspirational place that attracts bright, positive, and ambitious staff and students, and supports achievement. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisors, Professor Nikola Kasabov, Dr Grace Wang and Associate Professor Alexander Sumich, who supported and inspired me unconditionally throughout this journey.”
Zohreh is currently an associate investigator in an interdisciplinary project led by AUT researchers Professor Nikola Kasabov and Dr Maryam Doborjeh, which received funding from the MBIE Catalyst: Strategic – New Zealand-Singapore Data Science Research Programme Fund of over $2million for 3 years for the project ‘Computational neuro-genetic modelling for diagnosis and prognosis in mental health’.
“The project aims to better understand and predict disease progression using a combination of data science (DS) and artificial intelligence (AI) techniques. This study also boasts an unprecedented level of data varieties, including clinical, behavioural, and large-scale molecular data from cutting edge genomics, proteomics and metabonomic technologies. This is a collaboration between AUT, The University of Auckland and Nanyang Technological University.”