The B.E.E.S. group believes in the motto "people do science". This means we put people first and believe that research advances best in an environment of support and encouragement. Meet the team below:
Dr. Vianey Leos Barajas (she/her/ella)
I am an Assistant Professor, cross-appointed between the Department of Statistical Sciences (51%) and School of the Environment (49%) at the University of Toronto. I am primarily interested in working in the areas of ecological statistics, time series modeling, Bayesian statistics and, more recently, spatial modeling of environmental data.
I am currently a faculty affiliate at the Vector Institute and a faculty member of the Centre for Global Change Science at the University of Toronto. Additionally, I am serving a 2-year term on the Stan Governing Body and am the current secretary of the Statistical Ecology section of the Ecological Society of America.
Collaborative projects bring me loads of joy. So, while I am formally trained in mathematics and statistics, I’m likely to be working closely with ecologists (esp. those who work with sharks) often and on many projects.
Postdoctoral Researchers
Dr. Jessica Lievesley
Dr. Jessica Lievesley is a postdoctoral fellow in the Eric & Wendy Schmidt AI in Science program at the University of Toronto. She develops cutting edge ML & AI approaches for monitoring of ecological systems.
Research Interests: AI, machine learning, ecology
Co-PI: Dak de Kerckhove
PhD Students
Robert Zimmerman
Robert is a sixth-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests: Bayesian computation, probability theory, extreme value theory, mathematical finance
Principal supervisor: Radu Craiu
Yovna Junglee
Yovna is a second-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests: Bayesian inference, non-parametric and semi-parametric methods, spatio-temporal models, environmental & ecological statistics
Co-supervisor: Meredith Franklin
Arturo Esquivel Fuente
Arturo is a second-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests: Bayesian inference, spatio-temporal modeling, statistical computation, machine learning, applications in health, ecology and astronomy
Co-supervisor: Alán Aspuru-Guzik
Marco Gallegos Herrada
Marco is a second-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests: Bayesian statistics, time series, Markov chain Monte Carlo, applied statistics, environmental & ecological statistics
Co-supervisor: Jeffrey Rosenthal
Rodrigo Barradas Herrera
Rodrigo is a first-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests:
Co-supervisor: Gwen Eadie
Miguel Barreto
Miguel is a first-year PhD student in Statistical Sciences at the University of Toronto.
Research Interests:
Student Researchers
Undergraduate Students:
Former Students
PhD Students
Thesis: Advances in state-space models for the analysis of animal movement and behavior
University of Rosario, Argentina (Aug. 2022)
co-supervisor: Juan Morales
Undergraduate Students
Zuva Gwata
summer 2023
Project: Computational Tools for Exploring Multimodal Posterior Distributions
Major: Acturial Science
NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award Recipient
Lauren Gill
summer 2022
Project: Data Science for White Shark Conservation
Major: Biology (UBC)
Summer Undergraduate Data Science Research Program Participant
Winner of Best Talk at Resesarch Day
Jessica Long
summer 2021
Project: Multi-scale modeling of time series data for classification of shark behavior
Major: Mathematics, Statistical Sciences
Recipient of NSERC USRA + SURA award by Department of Statistical Sciences
Simone Collier
summer 2021
Project: Modeling the interaction between behavior and thermoregulation in lizards
Major: Mathematics, Environmental Sciences
Internship through the Centre for Global Change Science
Yun-Hsiang Chan
summer 2021
Project: Modeling basketball movement data with hidden Markov models.
Major: Statistical Sciences, Computer Science
Recipient of SURA award by Department of Statistical Sciences.
Sophie Berkowitz
summer 2021
Project: Modeling the interaction between behavior and thermoregulation in lizards
Major: Environmental Sciences
Partial scholarship through School of Environment
Vinky Wang
summer 2021
Project: Modeling Leopard Shark Aggregations Using Point Patterns and the Integrated Nested Laplace Approximation
Major: Statistical Sciences