Hi, I’m Rayleigh, a post-doc at Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. Motivated by data sets with interesting phenomena, but few variables to describe or explain the phenomena, my research is focused on developing and implementing Bayesian models. To do so, I use insights based on the geometry that underlie the data or model. Currently, I am working with Prof. Yajuan Si on improving credible interval coverage for small area estimates.

I obtained my Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. My advisor was Prof. Long Nguyen. I built models to transform data on simplexes to model changes in neighborhood income proportions. My PhD research also included establishing identifiability and posterior consistency conditions for and designing geometric algorithms to fit tree-based mixtures of topic models. A NSF Graduate Research Fellowship supported my PhD work. After my Ph.D., I worked with Prof. Abel Rodriguez on creating Bayesian models to better represent the ideological positions of political actors when members on the end vote together, but for different reasons.

I received my BA in mathematics from Columbia University. Before starting my Ph.D., I also had an opportunity to work under Professor Andrew Gelman, contributing to Stan and working on applied Bayesian regression projects.

I can be reached at rayleigh@umich.edu.