Postdoctoral position available -- see below for information.

This page is a placeholder -- it will eventually contain information about upcoming opportunities, and current and past students and postdocs.

I am always keen to collaborate with students/postdocs with interdisciplinary interests who wish to combine approaches from any or all of mathematical modelling, scientific computation, statistics, analysis, geometry, statistical physics, soft-matter physics, materials science, biophysics, or other related areas. We do a variety of types of research -- from constructing and analyzing models, to developing better algorithms, to analyzing data (numerically or experimentally generated), to collaborating with experimental groups. Our research tends to be question-oriented -- seeking new approaches to solve a particular scientific or algorithmic question -- which requires learning new tools and ideas along the way, and sometimes developing these new tools too. We welcome a diversity of students and respect the unique perspective each student brings.

Note the following:

  • Graduate students (MSc and PhD) should apply in December through the math department, for admission the following September. It is helpful to identify faculty with whom you would be interested in working, and listing them in your application. These faculty may contact you to discuss your interests, after you have applied.
  • MSc students spend a significant amount of time on research (this is a unique feature of Canadian MSc programs). Often, the MSc program is a precursor to the PhD program. It can help you better choose a PhD program or advisor, by giving you opportunities to try out an in-depth research project, get a better sense of your interests, and determine if and what you'd like to pursue for a 4-year PhD program.
  • Undergraduate opportunities for paid summer research for UBC students are available through the NSERC-URSA and WLIURA fellowship programs, for which you must apply through the math department, in approxiamately January. There may also be opportunities for international students funded by MITACS.
  • Postdoctoral researchers are encouraged to apply for NSERC fellowships and the PIMS fellowship. Sometimes there is additional funding. If you are a potential postdoctoral applicant, please contact me well ahead of time, to take advantage of all possibile funding opportunities.

Postdoctoral position available: Designing disordered materials

A postdoctoral position is available in the Department of Mathematics, University of British Columbia, to contribute to a collaborative, NSERC-funded project “Disordered Lattices: Mathematical Pathways to Engineering New Materials”. The idea state date would be Sept 1 2025 or earlier. A summary of the project is below. The postdoc will work with Dr. Miranda Holmes-Cerfon (Mathematics) and Dr. Adam Clare (Mechanical Engineering) and may also work closely with Dr. Dominic Liao-McPherson (Mechanical Engineering). We seek a researcher from a quantitative background (e.g. applied mathematics, physics, engineering, etc), with strong computational skills and good knowledge of applied stochastic processes, who may also be interested in any or all of optimization, probability, analysis, solid mechanics, materials science, statistical mechanics, design processes and furthermore who is interested in working as a team in an interdisciplinary setting of approximately five other student researchers. The position will also be partially funded through teaching one course per semester. This is a fantastic opportunity to undertake blue sky thinking within a newly formed team and help shape a longer term research initiative.

To apply, please do two things:
(i) apply online to the department’s advertised postdoctoral position:
https://www.mathjobs.org/jobs/list/25286
(ii) send an email to Miranda Holmes-Cerfon at holmescerfon@math.ubc.ca, with subject line “postdoc: disordered lattices”, and which briefly describes why you would be a good candidate for this position.

Applications will be evaluated starting January 10, 2025, until the position is filled.

Summary: Traditional approaches to lattice creation involve designing a unit cell that is repeated to create a macroscale material. Yet, periodic lattices result in a limited range of properties and are often prone to catastrophic failure under modest defect formation. On the other hand, the addition of disorder to a lattice, has been shown to improve its resilience, increase the isotropy of its response, and offer a larger design space of achievable properties. Indeed, biological materials, such as bone, shell, beak, and wood, have evolved to be intrinsically disordered, and they perform well in variable conditions. This provides a fantastic opportunity to create enhanced materials by exploiting intrinsic disorder.

With this motivation in mind, this project aims to formulate a design process and accompanying tools to create materials with enhanced properties using intrinsic disorder, namely randomness at many scales. The project will develop computational and mathematical tools to design functional materials that incorporate disorder, build prototypes of designed materials and evaluate their properties, update the design process in a synergistic loop, and produce user-friendly approaches for successful design protocols. The project will consider several material systems including strut-based materials, surface-based materials, and multimaterial lattices, and will develop tailored methods and experimental protocols for each system, as well as general theoretical methods to ”design with disorder”.