Markus ElKatsha is an architect and urban planner who studies the intersection of data-driven urban analysis tools and policy strategies for rapidly growing and urbanising cities. ElKatsha is a member of the City Science group within the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The City Science research group aims to identify new strategies for creating the places where people live and work, as well as the mobility systems that connect them, in order to meet the profound challenges of the future. For this, the group has been among the most active within MIT in catalysing new responses to the coronavirus pandemic.

Prior to joining the MIT Media Lab, ElKatsha worked for eight years at Boston-based architecture and urban design firm Machado and Silvetti Associates, where he worked on projects such as the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the Rockefeller Cultural Center in New York and the American University in Beirut. Most recently, he was for nine years executive director of a public/private development company responsible for two regions east and west of Cairo, Egypt. Currently, his work and research focus on new approaches to urban management and collaborative strategies for emerging and developing countries. In addition to a bachelor’s degree in architecture, ElKatsha holds two master’s degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in urban planning and architectural history, theory and criticism.