Vasant Dhar

Vasant Dhar is an Artificial Intelligence researcher and data scientist at the Stern School of Business and the Center for Data Science at New York University. His research focuses on the question: when do we trust AI systems with decision-making? This query is especially pertinent to autonomous machine-learning-based systems that learn and adapt to ongoing data.

During his time at Morgan Stanley, Dhar created the Data Mining Group. His research is also motivated by building predictive models in various domains. In the 1990s, he founded SCT Capital, one of the first automated machine learning-based hedge funds in New York City. He has also applied his research in areas such as finance, healthcare, sports, education, and business. His expertise in data science and artificial intelligence has led to affiliations with various academic institutions and organizations.

As a professor, Dhar teaches courses on Systematic Investing, Prediction, Data Science, and Foundations of FinTech. He also served as the editor-in-chief of the journal Big Data. In line with his teachings, he has written over 100 research articles funded by grants from industry and government agencies such as the National Science Foundation.

Dhar graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi with a B.Tech in chemical engineering and received his Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh.