Ran Tao
Assistant Professor
Contact
Office: NES 315
Phone: 813.974.1431
Email
Education
(2017) Ph.D. Geography and Urban Regional Analysis, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA
(2012) B.S. Remote Sensing Science and Technology, Wuhan University, China
Research
Dr. Tao's research centers on GIScience methods and applications, especially in movement analysis, travel behaviors, and spatial interaction phenomena. So far, he has developed a series of spatial flow data analytical methods that blend the latest techniques in spatial statistics, data mining, geovisualization, and geocomputation. His research has been sponsored by NSF, USDOT, and USF Research & Innovation. His works have been published in top-tier journals, such as IJGIS, CEUS, and Geographical Analysis. Besides, he is leading or engaged in interdisciplinary research projects that exert the power of GIS and spatial analysis, such as human travel behaviors, migration forced by natural disasters, shrinking city phenomena, location optimization of key infrastructure, and disease transmission surveillance. Dr. Tao has been actively serving the professional community. He was the 21-22 chair of AAG Specialty Group Cyberinfrastructure. He also serves as the NSF proposal reviewer, guest editor of special issues on Applied Sciences and IJGI.
STudents
Lauren Carter
Yuzhou Chen
Chuang Yin
Specialty Area
GIScience, spatial interactions, spatial statistics, spatial data mining, transportation, human mobility, migration, smart city