Ani Velo, PhD

Professor, Mathematics

• Ani P. Velo earned her Ph.D. in mathematics from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA in 2000. As a recipient of the Davies Fellowship award from the National Research Council, Washington D.C., Dr. Velo held a post-doctoral position at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, NY and U.S. Army Research Laboratory, MD. Prior to her Ph.D. studies, she graduated with excellence in mathematics from the University of Tirana, Albania, and completed her diploma thesis at the University of Siegen, Germany.

Dr. Velo joined the University of San Diego (USD) in 2002, where she has held the title of Professor of Mathematics since 2012.  Dr. Velo’s work at USD has been student focused. Shortly after joining USD, Dr. Velo pioneered the implementation of the mathematics major with applied emphasis program, and for many years until 2016, organized the Applied Mathematics Capstone Senior Project event in collaboration with other mathematics faculty. In collaboration with the USD engineering faculty, Dr. Velo initiated and led an international program sponsored by the elite Military Academy of Saint-Cyr, France, for almost ten years until 2011. As part of this program, Saint-Cyr cadets came to USD every year to work on research projects in mathematics and engineering under the guidance of faculty members from the respective departments. Currently, in collaboration with faculty from the USD Business School, Dr. Velo is leading the efforts for the Business Calculus curriculum redesign.

Dr. Velo’s research interests are mainly in applied mathematics to engineering and geophysics, and include wave propagation in layered media, structural optimization and composite materials. For over 20 years, Dr. Velo has maintained her research collaborations with the Army Research Laboratory, and engaged students in her research through the Senior Seminar, Summer Undergraduate Research Experience program and independent studies. All these collaborative efforts have enhanced the classroom teaching and have led to a number of journal publications, conference proceedings, presentations, grants and about twenty-five undergraduate research projects.

At USD, Professor Velo has taught a variety of undergraduate mathematics courses mostly in applied mathematics, such as Applied Mathematics for Science and Engineering, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Math Modeling, Senior Seminar, Mathematical Problem Solving Seminar, Business Calculus, Investigations in Mathematics, etc. In some of the upper division courses, Professor Velo has incorporated software such as Maple and Matlab, as well as technical writing software such as Latex.

Dr. Velo has served for many years as a reviewer for the National Academies on their Research Associateship and Fellowship Program for Mathematics and Engineering, as well as a mathematics judge at the Siemens Westinghouse Math, Science and Technology Competition. Currently, Dr. Velo serves as a judge for the Interdisciplinary Contest in Modeling (ICM), The Consortium for Mathematics and its Applications (COMAP). In the Mathematics Department, Dr. Velo continues to serve as the faculty coordinator for the William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition.

Webpage: http://sandiego.edu/~avelo

Scholarly Work

Office Hours

• MATH 311
• MATH 133