Vikram B. Baliga

Assistant Professor of Teaching, University of British Columbia

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Welcome

I am an Assistant Professor of Teaching in the Department of Zoology at UBC, with a special focus on Biostatistics and Data Science.

In the recent past, I was a scientist (also at UBC) whose work focused on animal locomotion, vision, and evolutionary biology. My research asked how musculoskeletal and visual systems allow animals to control complex motion. This means that I used motion capture and virtual reality to investigate animals’ locomotor behaviors, and examined the evolution of anatomy & physiology to understand mechanisms and limitations.

Data from behavioral or physiological studies tend to be extremely noisy. Making sense of information in these diverse data sets made me appreciate statistical methods and the design of effective visualizations. I also realized one of my favorite things to do is to work with people through these types of problems. My passion for discussing and teaching statistics developed organically as I steadily embraced the analytical aspects of my job and looked for opportunities to teach.

As an Assistant Professor, I now teach and/or coordinate BIOL 300: Fundamentals of Biostatistics regularly at UBC. Future teaching efforts may relate to DSCI 100 or courses that blend biology, statistics, and data science.

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