PyData PGH October Newsletter
PyData Pittsburgh Updates: Mentorship Panel, Monthly Events, Membership Survey
Fall is here, and PyData Pittsburgh has a full season ahead! From a mentorship panel and upcoming talks to our community survey, there are plenty of ways to get involved and help shape what’s next for our data community.
Mentorship in Analytics – Coming This November! 🌱
We’re thrilled to partner with INFORMS Pittsburgh, a group that brings together people passionate about data, optimization, and analytical decision making to foster collaboration, mentorship, and real world impact.
INFORMS Pittsburgh and PyData Pittsburgh are teaming up to host a panel on mentorship in analytics this November. A strong mentoring relationship supports the mentee’s whole career development, not just a single project or job. Be on the lookout for a brief survey where you can share the topics you’d most like discussed during the panel. Interested in joining the panel? Email us at organizers@pypgh.org
October Event – Driving Materials Innovation with Data 🔬
Thursday, October 16 | 6:00 pm Doors Open | 6:30 pm Talk Start
Speaker: Satish Iyengar – Professor & Associate Chair of Statistics, University of Pittsburgh
PyData Pittsburgh is excited to host our October event, Driving Materials Innovation with Data: The MDS-Rely Center for Industry-Academic Partnerships. Learn how data scientists, engineers, and statisticians are collaborating across institutions to bridge theory and practice, using real-world datasets to advance reliability and degradation research.
The MDS-Rely Center, a National Science Foundation (NSF) Industry–University Cooperative Research Center, unites academia and industry to improve materials performance, reliability, and service life. From predictive models for battery degradation to data-driven optimization in additive manufacturing, the Center is turning analytics into innovation across industries.
November Event – Bodo DataFrames: Scaling Pandas with HPC ⚡️
Tuesday, November 4 | Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship
Speaker: Ehsan Totoni – Co-founder & CTO, Bodo AI
Pandas is a staple for data scientists, but it struggles with large datasets — programs often become slow or memory-limited. In this talk, Ehsan Totoni introduces Bodo DataFrames, a fast, scalable, high-performance computing (HPC)–based drop-in replacement for Pandas.
Bodo leverages Message Passing Interface (MPI) and JIT compilation to accelerate and scale existing Pandas code — no rewrites required. You’ll get an overview of its architecture, real-world performance examples, and an honest look at current limitations. If you’ve ever wished Pandas could handle more data without breaking, this talk is for you! Look for the Bodo.ai Meetup announcement next week.
Take the PyData PGH Member Survey
Your input helps shape future events, panels, and workshops!
This quick 10-minute survey is the best way to tell us what you’d like to see next from PyData Pittsburgh.