NC State Statistician Receives NSF CAREER Award

Eric Chi, an assistant professor in the Department of Statistics at NC State, has received a Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The award, also known as the NSF CAREER award, is one of the highest awards the foundation bestows upon young faculty in the sciences.

The five-year award will support Chi’s research project entitled “Stable and Scalable Estimation of the Intrinsic Geometry of Multiway Data.” The project aims to develops a new framework for identifying complicated underlying patterns in multiway arrays, which will assist in more effectively analyzing high-resolution data collected in fields such as bioinformatics and neuroscience. Chi will focus on nonparametric estimation of low-dimensional structure and geometry in big and noisy data arrays.

Chi will also develop a training program based on applications of his research to recruit and retain talented high school, undergraduate and graduate students from underrepresented minority groups for potential careers as innovative data scientists.

Chi received his Ph.D. in statistics from Rice University in 2011 and completed postdoctoral work at Rice University and the University of California, Los Angeles. He also has an M.S. in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and a B.A. in physics from Rice University.