Dr. Michael Salter-Townshend

Dr. Michael Salter-Townshend

Assistant Professor of Statistics

UCD profile page

Biography

I am an Assistant Professor of Statistics in University College Dublin in the School of Mathematics and Statistics.

The icons under my photo are links to some online accounts I use.

My research spans statistical genetics, network analysis, palaeoclimate reconstruction, and sentiment analysis. See my publications below for more information or browse by topic by clicking projects in the navigation bar above.

Interests

  • Statistical Genetics
  • Network Analysis
  • Climate Reconstruction
  • Computational Statistics
  • Bayesian Statistics

Education

  • PhD in Statistics, 2009

    Trinity College Dublin

  • MSc in High Performance Computing, 2004

    Trinity College Dublin

  • BA Mod Computational Physics, 2003

    Trinity College Dublin

People

Current PhD Students:

Former PhD Students:

MSc Students Supervision:

  • M.Sc. in Statistics, University College Dublin
  • M.Sc. in Data and Computational Science, University College Dublin
  • M.Sc. in Actuarial Science, University College Dublin
  • M.Sc. in Applied Statistics, University of Oxford

Projects

Statistical Genetics

Statistical Genetics

Statistical Analysis of genetics data, mostly focussing on Population Genetics.

Network Analysis

Network Analysis

Analysis of data comprising links between nodes.

Palaeoclimate Reconstruction

Palaeoclimate Reconstruction

Inferring past climates based on proxies such as pollen.

Text / Topics / Sentiment

Text / Topics / Sentiment

Analysis of text, modelling both topic and sentiment.

Miscellaneous Projects

Miscellaneous Projects

Anything that doesn’t have another home

Recent Publications

Quickly discover relevant content by filtering publications.

Software

Software I have written / contributed to for general distribution

  • MOSAIC Tool for modelling multiway admixture using dense genotype data.

  • aniSNA Obtain network structures from animal GPS telemetry observations and statistically analyse them to assess their adequacy for social network analysis. Methods include pre-network data permutations, bootstrapping techniques to obtain confidence intervals for global and node-level network metrics, and correlation and regression analysis of the local network metrics.

  • VBLPCM Fit and simulate latent position and cluster models for network data, using a fast Variational Bayes approximation.

  • egoTERGM Estimation of ego-temporal exponential random graph models.

  • Review of Statistical Network Analysis: Models, Algorithms and Software R scripts used to run the examples in the supplementary document to the paper “Review of Statistical Network Analysis: Models, Algorithms and Software” (Statistical Analysis and Data Mining, 2012). The entire directory (input files and R scripts) is archived in a single file.

Teaching

I am currently lecturing the following courses in UCD:

Courses I previously lectured:

  • Time Series Analysis
  • Time Series Analysis Actuarial App
  • Time Series (Online)
  • Bayesian Analysis (level 2 undergraduate module)
  • Bayesian Analysis (level 4 masters module)
  • Bayesian Analysis (Online)
  • Statistics Using R for Computational Biologists, University College Dublin (2011, 2012, 2013).
  • Case Studies in Simulation Science, University College Dublin (2013).
  • Statistics and Mathematics in Computational Biology, University College Dublin (2009, 2010).
  • Transferable Skills: Statistics I and II (Ph.D. level), University College Dublin (2010, 2011).
  • Advanced Quantitative Research Methods module, School of Nursing, Trinity College Dublin (2007).
  • Introduction to Management Science, Dept. of Statistics, Trinity College Dublin (2007).

Courses I previously tutored:

  • Visiting Students’ Tutor in Statistics, Mansfield College, University of Oxford (2015, 2016).
  • Stochastic Models in Mathematical Genetics, University of Oxford (2014, 2015).
  • Introduction to Unix, School of Mathematics, Trinity College Dublin (2005-2006).
  • Numerical Computing, School of Mathematics, Trinity College Dublin (2005-2007).

Activities

Professional Activities:

Refereeing:

Statistical Genetics:

Statistics and Machine Learning:

Other:

Assorted Other activities:

  • Organiser of DPhil / postdoc seminar series, Dept. of Statistics, University of Oxford (2013-2016).
  • Green Impact committee, Dept. of Statistics, University of Oxford (2013-2016).
  • Interview board for hiring to CeADAR (Centre for Applied Data Analytics Research) (2013).
  • Exam marking for Mathematics, University of Oxford (2015, 2016).
  • Facilitator of academic taster sessions and application conferences for Mansfield College (2015).
  • Maintenance Committee Irish Supercomputer List (2013-2018).

Contact