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Headshot_Zhan_Zhao
Dr ZHAO, Zhan

Assistant Professor
Department of Urban Planning and Design
Faculty of Architecture
The University of Hong Kong

zhanzhao@hku.hk  
 Room 809, 8/F, Knowles Building, Main Campus

About Me

Dr. Zhan Zhao is an Assistant Professor based in the Department of Urban Planning and Design (DUPAD) at the University of Hong Kong (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.

Dr. Zhao holds a PhD degree in Transportation from MIT, Master’s degree from University of British Columbia (UBC) and Bachelor’s degree from Tongji University. Prior to joining HKU, he was a senior data scientist at Via, a transportation network company providing on-demand transit services. Previously, he also 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
Urban Computing and Spatiotemporal Data Mining; Human Mobility Prediction and Travel Behavior Modeling; Transportation Systems Analysis; Network Science for Urban Planning and Design