Gayatri Kawlra
- Gayatri Kawlra is an experienced computational social scientist specializing in the political economy of emerging technologies. She earned her Ph.D. from Columbia University, where she is currently an adjunct assistant professor. Her latest course, "Reimagine the City with Web 3.0," focuses on the transformative potential of decentralized technologies for urban governance and the ethics of data-driven governance models. Previously, she taught "Urban Data and Informatics," leveraging Python for advanced quantitative analysis, spatial mapping, and data visualization. Her academic contributions include multiple first-author publications and conference presentations on the ethics of synthetic populations for urban computing, mapping spatial injustice, and Web3 and the future of society. She co-founded and managed Earth Labs, a company dedicated to making Ethereum transaction receipts accessible to non-technical users. With over six years of experience in conducting mixed methods research and policy analysis, Gayatri has had the opportunity to work with interdisciplinary teams at institutions such as Columbia World Projects, the Center for Spatial Research, and the Rockefeller Foundation. She contributed to high-impact projects including Microsoft Research's ElectionGuard pilot, a digital identity project in Sub-Saharan Africa alongside the Oxford Internet Institute, and a digital mental health intervention trial with experts from Columbia Irving Medical Center and New York State Office of Mental Health. Gayatri is passionate about human-centered product innovation, balancing the risks and benefits of decentralized technologies, and exploring the intersection between technology and society.
- @0xGaya
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/gayatrikawlra/
