Alumnus, Professor Study Social Media Usefulness During Disasters

Just hours after a powerful earthquake killed hundreds of people in Turkey and left thousands homeless Oct. 23, thousands of others were offering shelter via Twitter and email.

It’s just one example of how the use of social media is reshaping the way people respond to natural disasters and other large-scale emergencies. But Wright State University professor and Ohio State engineering alumnus Amit Sheth believes we’ve just scratched the surface of its potential.

Leading a research team that includes Srini Parthasarathy, an Ohio State professor of computer science and engineering and biomedical informatics, Sheth is developing new ways to extract meaningful information from hundreds of thousands of Twitter and other messages as they are posted during emergencies.

Sheth received his Ohio State computer and information science master's degree in 1983 and doctorate in 1985. He is the LexisNexis Ohio Eminent Scholar for Advanced Data Management and Analysis, an endowed faculty position funded by LexisNexis and the Ohio Board of Regents, at Wright State University. Parthasarathy's research interests are in data mining, bioinformatics and clinical informatics, high performance computing, network science and database systems.

 Read more in the Wright State University newsroom report.