Mathematical Biology
Group overview
The Mathematical Biology Group at UBC is an interdisciplinary research group that applies mathematics in a wide range of biological fields including immunology, epidemiology, molecular, cell and developmental biology, electrophysiology and neuroscience, ecology, game theory and evolution. Specific areas of focus include protein interactions and protein mobility, regulation of gene expression, cell behaviour, tissue mechanics, immune responses, epidemic dynamics, bacterial cell division, the evolution of cooperation, game theory, speciation, and social aggregation (swarming). The group consists of a large group of core faculty members, some with cross appointments, and many affiliated faculty in mathematics and other departments, and a good number of postdoctoral researchers and graduate students. It is one of Canada’s largest and most established math biology groups.
info for prospective students
We teach undergraduate and graduate courses in mathematical biology. Graduate students receive degrees (Master's and PhD) as members of the UBC Institute of Applied Mathematics. We are always interested to hear from potential graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. We recruit from many different backgrounds, including mathematics, physics, chemistry, computer science, statistics, engineering and the biological sciences. We often supervise undergraduate thesis projects (for instance, from the Biophysics and Integrated Science programs) and take on undergraduate students as volunteers (REX) and through summer award programs (NSERC USRA and WLI URA).
People
| Faculty | Research Interests |
|---|---|
| Daniel Coombs | immune cell biophysics, microscopy, disease dynamics |
| Eric Cytrynbaum | Self-organization and pattern formation in cell and developmental biology; cardiac electrophysiology; dynamics of excitable systems. |
| Khanh Dao Duc | Molecular and Cell biology, Gene expression, Cryo-EM microscopy, Biological shape analysis, Machine learning, Applied stochastic process |
| Michael Doebeli | Foundations of evolutionary theory, evolution in high-dimensional phenotype spaces, multi-level selection, and cultural evolution in human societies. |
| James (Jimmy) Feng | Cell and tissue mechanics, fluid dynamics, complex fluids |
| Christoph Hauert | Evolutionary game theory, structured populations, cooperation, reward and punishment. |
| Miranda Holmes-Cerfon | applied math: mathematical modelling, computational mathematics, stochastic analysis, statistical mechanics, soft-matter physics, materials science, biophysics, computational geometry |
| Yue-Xian Li | Calcium dynamics, signal transduction in cells, biophysics, neuroscience. |
| Anotida Madzvamuse | Coupling bulk-surface geometric PDEs with multi-physics for cell motility and pattern formation; Data-driven modelling in Experimental Sciences and Healthcare |
| Geoffrey Schiebinger | optimization, single cell analysis, applied probability |
| Emeritus | Research Interests |
|---|---|
| Fred Brauer | Mathematical modelling of epidemiological problems and population systems, with emphasis on the dynamical system aspects and approaches |
| Leah Edelstein-Keshet | Models for cell motility, social aggregation and swarming |
| Postdoctoral Researchers | Research Interests |
|---|---|
| Laurent MacKay |
| Graduate Students | Research Interests |
|---|---|
| Katharine Faulkner | Mathematical Biology |
| Shikun Nie | |
| Merlin Pelz | Nonlinear dynamics, analysis (real, complex, numerical, stochastic), probability, PDEs, SDEs, applied mathematics (especially to biology) |
| Jaye Sudweeks | |
| Liam Yih | Biophysics, virus dynamics |