Welcome to the webpage of Dr. Tomasz G. Smolinski, a.k.a. me. :)

Throughout my entire academic career, I have pursued interdisciplinary research linking information technology and computer science with other sciences, as well as business and industry. The areas in which I have worked range from experimental neurobiology and bioinformatics, through audio/video engineering, e-Commerce and supply chain management, to university fiscal and facilities management. These experiences have afforded me the invaluable opportunity to work in collaboration with many scientists, as well as practitioners in the administrative and business fields, and to apply the most recent advances in computer science and information technology to real-life problems in those areas. Undoubdetly, however, my greatest passion has always lain in the practical applications of computational methods in the "bio field."

After obtaining my Ph.D. from the University of Louisville in 2004, under the supervision of Professor Jacek M. Zurada, I worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow in the lab of Professor Astrid A. Prinz at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, specializing in computational neuroscience.

While at Emory, I also taught a course on research-oriented computer literacy for life science majors, which reignited my passion for teaching and propelled me to seek out opportunities related to pedagogy. As a result, I became a Postdoctoral Scholar in the NSF-sponsored program Faculty Institutes for Reforming Science Teaching, Fourth Edition (FIRST IV), as well as a recipient of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Undergraduate Biological Sciences Program Curriculum Development / Teaching Fellowship, during which I was mentored by Professor Patricia Marsteller.

In approximately 2014, I decided to rekindle my life-long passion for Native American history and cultures, and began searching for formal, educational avenues to enhance my knowledge of the subject. In 2016, I completed the Graduate Certificate Program in Native American Studies at Montana State University. One of the courses I took at MSU was called "Federal Indian Law and Policy," and through that course, I became absolutely fascinated by the field of Native American Law, and the law in general. As a result, I made the decision to expand the scope of my research to include the area of legal informatics (roughly speaking, the applications of computer science and information technology in the field of law), and continued to search for further educational opportunities. I could not believe my luck when I subsequently discovered the Blended Learning Program at Mitchell Hamline School of Law, which would not only allow me to pursue an ABA-accredited Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree on my own time, but to also focus specifically on Indian/Tribal Law, as well as Intellectual Property Law, in which I also became very much interested in the process. In the Spring of 2021, I received my J.D. from Mitchell Hamline, which I intend to use to more effectively aid the Native American communities throughout the United States, in particular as it pertains to the much-needed, and glaringly lacking, protection of traditional knowledge and expression, as well as other types of Indigeous intellectual property.

I hope you enjoy browsing these pages!

Best regards,

Dr. Tomasz G. Smolinski