
Vidya Samadi grew up in the Caspian Sea region between Europe and Asia. His parents instilled him and his brothers and sisters the conviction that education is the key to obtaining personal and professional success.
This belief and the skills she has acquired by learning to play chess helped her succeed.
“During my education, my parents strongly highlighted the value of obtaining a good education, to encourage me and my siblings to excel in school and to continue higher education as a means of obtaining personal and professional success,” said Samadi. “Since we were very young, my father encouraged us to participate in athletics which requires logical thought and decision -making, such as playing failures.
“I believe that the principles of chess helped to refine my logical reasoning and my strategic thought – the skills I needed to be a successful engineer.”
Today, Samadi is a water resources engineer who applies his parents to help train students from the University of Clemson to become successful water resources engineers.
A family of engineers
Be a short engineer in his family.
“Growing up, I idolized many family members who were engineers,” said Samadi. “I wanted to be like them. Unlike my brothers and sisters who obtained their university diplomas in computer science and mathematics, I decided to study engineering. At a very young age, I was initially attracted to software genius specifically because my uncle was a computer programmer, and I was fascinated by his work. »»

The city – Gorgan, Iran – where Samadi grew up is on the border of Turkmenistan, formerly the Soviet Union.
While working on her baccalaureate in engineering at the University of Gorgan, she took general engineering courses as well as advanced courses in mathematics and physics. After this program, enriched its experiences.
“I have established deep friendships with my teachers, including my mechanical teacher of mechanics and fluid mechanics, who has become a mentor by sharing ideas beyond the classroom on career choices,” said Samadi. “I took his lessons during my second year. He magnificently explained the dynamics of fluids which are the foundation of understanding the water movement in rivers and in the basement was the moment when my interest in water resources engineering was triggered. After obtaining my undergraduate diploma, I decided to continue my graduate diploma in water resources engineering. »»
High school
After having successfully completed the entrance exam of the National University of Iran, Konkur, the Samadi was accepted in the higher education program of the University of Tehran to study water resources engineering. She then moved to the United Kingdom and joined the Hydro-environmental research center In the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering of the University of Cardiff, where she conducted research under the leadership of the professor Catherine Wilson in environmental water and IT.
Today, she uses her knowledge and experiences “… to feed the next generation of innovative engineers by providing a rigorous academic basis, promoting intellectual thinking and by conducting relevant research that comes under the challenges of real world water resources, ultimately contributing to the progress of the engineering field and its positive impact on society.”
She encourages other women to become engineers like her.
“I am passionate about obtaining more girls to pursue engineering careers because of the millions of jobs that will require engineering skills in the coming years and because success in the digital age depends on the fully use of the talents of both sexes,” said Samadi.

Coming to Clemson
Samadi joined the Department of Agricultural Sciences at the University of Clemson in January 2020. She chose Clemson “because of her strong reputation in research related to engineering and her commitment to the granting of land to serve the community”. They align themselves “perfectly” with his career interests.
“The dynamic community of members of the faculty which is carrying out advanced work in this area, as well as the possibilities of collaboration and mentoring, have highlighted this institution as the ideal place to continue my university career,” she said. “While at Clemson, I hope to inspire the next generation of water resources engineers – in particular women engineers – to democratize access to water resources tools and create a favorable and collaborative learning environment where everyone can prosper.
Collaboration is important
“Collaboration on the workplace is not to work together; It is a question of creating a synergy where the collective impact of the team is much larger than each individual contribution, “said Samadi.
An example of his collaboration understands working with Clemson Researchers and Emergency Management of South Carolina staff to develop a Flood evacuation tool To help provide floods, identify the risk roads and check the safe evacuation routes. This free tool combines artificial intelligence (AI) with human knowledge. Researchers use this Human-Ai (HAT) team partnership to create an intelligent model to combat flooding decisions in the coastal rural communities of South South Carolina.

Another example of his collaboration is a subsidy that she and Matthew BoyerAssociate Professor of Clemson Research in the Department of Science Engineering and Teaching, received from the National Science Foundation Cyberinfrastructure Office in the United States Cyberinfrastructure train (CI) Users and contributors to water science and engineering.
WatersofthackA free two -week virtual program for researchers and students was part of this training. This training was launched in 2024 with more than 160 participants, including 15 scholarship holders of the program. He will continue until 2026.
In addition to the Samadi and Boyer, other collaborators are the student graduated from Clemson, Krishna Panthi, the professors of the University of Iowa Ibrahim Demir and Bijaya Adhikari, the graduate student of the University of Iowa, Carlos Ramirez, and the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science Inc. (Cuahsi) Anthony Castronova.
For his research, Samadi was honored with 2024 Prize in mid-Carrier For the applied research of the Council of Universities on Water Resources for its research focused on the implementation of hydroinformatics and cyber-physical systems to meet the challenges associated with the modeling of water resources.
Charles Privet, president of the Clemson Agricultural Sciences Department, praised Samadi for her research contributions.
“Since he joined the Department of Agricultural Sciences in 2020, Dr. Samadi has been a very productive researcher,” said Privet. “Not only has she received numerous NSF subsidies, but she also supervised many graduate students and excelled in the results of her research published in research journals evaluated by peers. In the culmination with her time in AG Sciences, she received several exceptional performance prizes for her research contributions. »»
In addition to being a Clemson researcher, Samadi was an assistant research professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department of the University of Southern Carolina and postdoctoral researcher with the Noaa Center for the integrated sciences and evaluations of Caroline (CISA-USC).
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