ITS Irvine student and researcher won the third Place in COVID-19 Grand Challenge hosted by C3.ai

 Rezwana Rafiq, Tanjeeb Ahmed, and Md Yusuf Sarwar Uddin

The team formed by Rezwana Rafiq (researcher at ITS Irvine), Tanjeeb Ahmed (ITS Irvine graduate student), and Md Yusuf Sarwar Uddin (Assistant Professor at University of Missouri-Kansas City) won the 3rd place in the COVID-19 Grand Challenge hosted by C3.ai. The team will be awarded $12,500 for developing "meaningful data-driven insights that will help the global community understand and mitigate not only the spread of COVID-19, but also prepare the world to fight future pandemics, improve the medical community’s ability to respond, and help policymakers navigate decisions about COVID-19."

Their project "Structural Modeling of COVID Spread in Relation to Human Mobility",  "models causal relationships between human mobility indicators (trips, distance traveled, staying at home, and social distancing) and COVID-19 spread to inform how policymakers should take action."

See details here.