Bio

Dr. Zhan Zhao is an Assistant Professor based in the Department of Urban Planning and Design (DUPAD) at the University of Hong Kong (HKU). He is also an affiliated member at the Urban Systems Institute (USI) and Musketeers Foundation Institute of Data Science (IDS) at HKU. His research interests lie in the intersection of data science, human behavior, and urban mobility. In particular, his research contributes to the general field of urban science through integrating advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence into spatiotemporal data analysis for analyzing human behavior, characterizing urban dynamics, and designing new mobility solutions.

Prior to joining HKU, Zhan was a senior data scientist at Via, a transportation network company providing on-demand transit services. He holds a PhD degree in Transportation from MIT, where he was a research assistant at Transit Lab and Urban Mobility Lab. Over the years, he worked at, and collaborated with, several research institutes and government agencies around the world, including Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART), IBM Research - Ireland, Transport for London, TransLink (British Columbia), and Energy Foundation China.

Research Interests

• AI and Network Science for Urban Transport Planning
• Human Mobility and Travel Behavior
• Public Transit and Shared Mobility Systems