Saritha Kodikara

Saritha Kodikara

Research Fellow

University of Melbourne

Biography

Hello, and welcome! I’m a research fellow in Computational Genomics & Statistics at the University of Melbourne School of Mathematics and Statistics. I earned my PhD in Statistics from RMIT University, Australia, under the supervision of Professor Lewi Stone, Dr Haydar Demirhan and Dr Yan Wang.

My research interests include applications of statistics in ecology and biology. I work in the Le Cao Lab on a project that develop statistical techniques on microbial communities. Learn more about my research interests in publications.

Interests
  • Bayesian Statistics
  • Computational Statistics
  • Time Series Analysis
  • Applied statistics
  • R programming
Education

  • PhD in Mathematical Sciences, 2020

    RMIT University

  • BSc (Hons) Special Degree in Statistics, 2014

    University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka

Experience

 
 
 
 
 
Research Fellow
University of Melbourne
Jan 2021 – Present Melbourne, Australia.
 
 
 
 
 
Casual Lecturer
RMIT University
Jul 2018 – Oct 2020 Melbourne, Australia.
  • Delivered the MATH2305 Applied Bayesian Statistics course for the undergraduate students.
  • Delivered the MATH2204 Forecasting course for the undergraduate students.
  • Delivered the MATH2301 Predictive Modeling course for the undergraduate students.
 
 
 
 
 
Tutor
RMIT University
Feb 2017 – Oct 2020 Melbourne, Australia.

Courses:

  • MATH1318 Time Series Analysis (Postgraduate students)
  • MATH1307 Forecasting (Postgraduate students)
  • MATH1312 Regression Analysis (Postgraduate students)
  • MATH1324 Introduction to Statistics (Postgraduate students)
  • MATH2349 Data Pre-processing (Postgraduate students)
  • MATH2200 Introduction to Probability and Statistics (Undergraduate students)
 
 
 
 
 
Assistant Manager – Actuarial
Union Assurance PLC
Feb 2016 – Dec 2016 Colombo 03, Sri Lanka

Responsibilities include:

  • Performing Quarterly and Annual Actuarial valuation to identify the solvency of the company and advise management high risk products.
  • Preparation of detailed analysis in order to identify trigger points (i.e. Lapse reports).

Recent Publications

Saritha Kodikara, Haydar Demirhan, Yan Wang, Lewi Stone (2020). Inferring extinction date of a species using non‐homogeneous Poisson processes with a change‐point. Methods in Ecology and Evolution.

PDF Cite Code DOI

Saritha Kodikara, Haydar Demirhan, Yan Wang, Andrew Solow, Lewi Stone (2020). Inferring extinction year using a Bayesian approach. Methods in Ecology and Evolution.

PDF Cite Code Dataset DOI

See all publications

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