Astrit Tola

Education

University of Texas at Dallas (Expected 2025)
PhD in Mathematics

University of Texas at Dallas (December 2024)
MS in Mathematics, specializing in Data Science

Middle East Technical University (June 2018)
BS in Mathematics, Graduated with Honors

Certifications

• Python Data Structures, Coursera
• Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python), Coursera

Experience

University of Texas at Dallas, Teaching Assistant (January 2021 - Present)
Through customized instruction and assistance, I oversaw mathematics courses, resulting in significant improvements in student comprehension and academic performance..

University of Texas at Dallas, Research Assistant (May 2023 - Aug 2023, May 2024 - Aug 2024)
I conducted research in Machine Learning, Topological Data Analysis, Graph Neural Networks, and drug discovery, collaborating with faculty and peers on innovative projects.

Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye (Tubitak), Scholar (Dec 2018 - May 2020)
I performed advanced research on Dynamical Systems and Chaos Theory.

Skills

Technical Skills: Python, PyTorch, PySpark, Matlab, LaTeX, Microsoft Office, C++, R, Graph Neural Networks, Machine Learning, Topological Data Analysis, SQL (Beginner)

Publications

Publications

• A. Tola, J. A. Myrich, B. Coskunuzer. (2025) PROXI: Challenging the GNNs for Link Prediction. accepted in Transactions on Machine Learning Research (TMLR), https://arxiv.org/pdf/2410.01802.
• M. Akhmet, M. O. Fen, A. Tola. (2023) A Numerical Analysis of Poincaré Chaos. Discontinuity, Nonlinearity, and Complexity, 12(1), 183-195.
• M. Akhmet, M. O. Fen, A. Tola. (2022) Strange Non-Chaotic Attractors with Unpredictable Trajectories. Journal of Vibration Testing and System Dynamics, 6(3), 317-327, https://arxiv.org/pdf/2110.15805.
• M. Akhmet, A. Tola. (2020) Unpredictable Strings. Kazakh Mathematical Journal, 20(3), 16-22, https://arxiv.org/pdf/2006.08523.

Submitted Papers

• A. Tola, MD J. Uddin, C. G. Akcora, B. Coskunuzer. Topological Transformers for Graph Representation Learning.
• A. Tola, S. Aziz, D. Zhabilov, D. Winkler, M. Candas, B. Coskunuzer. Identification of Molecular Compounds Targeting Bacterial Propionate Metabolism with Topological Machine Learning. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.10.26.620439v1.
• MD J. Uddin, A. Tola, C. G. Akcora, B. Coskunuzer. Wise-GNN: Enhancing GNNs with Wise Embeddings. submitted.
• MD J. Uddin, A. Tola, C. G. Akcora, B. Coskunuzer. ClassContrast: Bridging the Spatial and Contextual Gaps for Node Representations. https://arxiv.org/pdf/2410.02158.
• A. Tola, F. M. Taiwo, C. G, Akcora, B. Coskunuzer. TopER: Topological Embeddings in Graph Representation Learning. https://arxiv.org/pdf/2410.01778.