Research Vignettes
Modelling of chemotherapy action
I am working with Dr. Shridar Ganesan and Dr. Gyan Bhanot of the Cancer
Institute of New Jersey in order to stochastically model the action of
chemotherapy on various breast cancer subtypes. In doing so, we hope to
improve treatment methods by showing ways in which chemotherapy can delivered
more effectively and efficiently. A secondary goal is to create an
intuitive GUI that predicts tumor response to various types, dosages, and
durations of chemotherapy.
Application of Knot Theory to DNA topology
Knot Theory is a beautiful branch of pure mathematics that incorporates
ideas from differential geometry, algebraic topology, and many others. Its
applications are rich and far-reaching, and it is classically used to explain
several phenomena in string theory and quantum mechanics. More recently,
it has been shown to explain how DNA knots and links during supercoiling and
homologous recombination events. This is of particular interest to
biologists, as it provides a much more comprehensive model than the limited
information yielded by electron microscopy. I am
investigating how DNA exploits supercoiling to facilitate gene regulation and
the knotting events that make this possible.