Dr. Chad Schafer

Biography

Chad Schafer is a Professor in the Department of Statistics at Carnegie Mellon University, where he received his Ph.D. in statistics from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2004. He holds an M.S. in Statistics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. from Western Michigan University. Prior to his academic appointments, he spent 1.5 years working at the Mathematics and Computer Science Division of Argonne National Laboratory, where he contributed to constructing a climate model. His research interest includes the rigorous handling of complex models and data structures that are increasingly prevalent in the sciences. For instance, cosmological models often involve key unknown physical constants, and modern astronomical surveys produce data that promises accurate estimates of various quantities. This field demands statistical methods tailored to theoretical models, especially when dealing with noisy, high-dimensional data. Alongside his research, he places a strong emphasis on teaching and educational activities, maintaining close interactions with domain scientists, which has greatly enriched his work.

Research Interests