Our Team

As an organization, MGGG operates on multiple scales. We have a core group for ongoing Lab activities and a larger group of contributors and collaborators working with us on various projects.

Core Team

Chris Donnay (chris@mggg.org) is our lab manager. He got his PhD in mathematics from the Ohio State University. As a former high school math and computer science teacher, Chris is also passionate about pedagogy and science communication. He works on many data analysis projects at the lab and is the principal developer for VoteKit.

Moon Duchin (mduchin@mggg.org) founded MGGG at Tufts University in 2016 to focus mathematical attention on redistricting. Her areas of mathematical expertise are in geometry, topology, and dynamical systems. At the University of Chicago, she is a professor of data science and computer science.

Dylan Halpern works as a software engineer at the Data Science Institute at the University of Chicago and collaborates with MGGG as a core developer on Districtr. His background is in Urban Planning and Civic Technology (Master in City Planning, MIT) and visual communication (BFA, VCU), and his research interests are urban and regional analytics, democratized and low-cost civic technologies, and geospatial data viz.

Hane Lee (hane@mggg.org) is a postdoc in the lab. They received their PhD from Columbia University, where they studied statistical methods for political science. Hane’s research interests lie in the intersection of race, politics, and quantitative methodology.

Phousawanh Peaungvongpakdy (he/him) is currently a Math PhD student at Washington State University, where he broadly researches mathematical and computational democracy. He has worked on parallel tempered optimization schemes for redistricting maps and election forecasting. In his free time, he enjoys baking bread and pastries.

Peter Rock (peter@mggg.org) graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder where he studied discrete differential geometry, at the intersection of computer science and differential geometry. Currently, he works for the lab as a research scientist, and is interested in computational geometry, graph algorithms, and applications to redistricting. Peter manages research code for the lab.

Parker Rule graduated from Tufts University with degrees in mathematics, computer science, and STS (Science, Technology, and Society). He is interested in operations research, scientific computing, and computational geometry. He has worked in the lab as a software engineer and researcher, and maintains collaborations on database and high-performance computing projects.

Shubham Singh is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Illinois Chicago, where he applies machine-learning and mathematical models to the challenges of operationalizing efficiency and fairness in socio-technical systems. He’ll soon join the lab as a postdoc. His research interests are in computational social science, responsible machine learning, and AI evaluations.

Summer Fellows 2025

Michelle Contreras-Catalán (she/her) is a recent graduate from Amherst College, where she majored in Computer Science and Mathematics. At Amherst, Michelle worked on algorithms for validating statistically significant knowledge discovery results. She is interested in algorithmic game theory, particularly in problems that bridge theoretical computer science with socially oriented problems.

Cole Gaines recently graduated from Cornell University with a degree in Operations Research and Information Engineering. He plans on attending London School of Economics for an MSc in operations research next year.

Sophia Guo is an undergraduate student at University of Michigan studying math and economics. She is interested in labor and development economics.

Edouard Heitzmann is a PhD candidate in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Colorado Boulder. He studies Markov Chains and Martingales, and is currently researching auditing methods for STV elections. Outside of Math, he enjoys hiking, skiing, and ice-skating.

Chloe Ireland is a math PhD candidate at The Ohio State University. She studies random groups and geometric group theory. Aside from doing math, she spends her time running, playing board games, and hanging out with her cat.

Finn Kingsbury is an undergraduate at Wellesley College majoring in Data Science, with interests in computational social science, civic data, and digital humanities.

Odelia Larbi-Amoah is a fourth-year undergraduate at Emory University pursuing a degree in Quantitative Sciences and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (WGS). She is interested in how theories regarding race, gender, and class apply to pop culture, film, and literature. Her interests lie in the intersection between data science and WGS and how they can be used for advocacy among different demographics!

Rebecca Mann is a PhD student in the Brooks School of Public Policy at Cornell University. They are studying applied microeconomics, and have worked in urban, health, and labor economics. Outside of academics, they enjoy telling people fun facts about the great state of Maryland.

Suvadip Sana is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Statistics and Data Science at Cornell University. For research, he works in Computational Social Choice and AI Alignment. Beside research, he enjoys hiking, soccer and cooking.

Brantley Vose is a math PhD student at The Ohio State University. He studies mathematical data science, specifically geometric methods like enforcement and detection of symmetry. In his free time he enjoys bouldering and playing his ukulele.

Key Collaborators, Past and Present

Hakeem Angulu

Jamie Atlas

Amy Becker

Mira Bernstein

Talia Blum

Hazel Brenner

Ruth Buck

Jeanne Clelland

Emarie De La Nuez

Daryl DeFord

Luis Delgadillo

Jack Deschler

Nick Doiron

Rory Ehrlich

Max Fan

Jack Gibson

Dara Gold

Ryan Gomez

Nestor Guillen

Todd Hendricks

Rachel Herman

Andrew Hong

Peter Horvath

Max Hully

Greg Kehne

Aidan Kestigian

Cyrus Kirby

Karin Knudson

Liz Kopecky

Brenda Macias

Beth Malmskog

JN Matthews

Fred McBride

Quinn Molloy

Malavika Mukundan

Mai Nguyen

Oliver Nguyen

Ari Nieh

Jordan Phan

Anthony Pizzimenti

Chanel Richardson

Heather Rosenfeld

Michael Sarahan

Gabe Schoenbach

Zachary Schutzman

Justin Solomon

Brad Souders

Ari Stern

Charles Stewart

Bhushan Suwal

Jamie Tucker-Foltz

Robbie Veglahn

Valeria Velasquez

Olivia Walch

Jennifer Wang

Thomas Weighill

Oliver York