Marek Kimmel

Population Dynamics, Branching Processes, Mathematics of DNA

M.S. (1977) Silesian Technical University

Ph. D. (1980) Silesian Technical University

After receiving his doctoral degree in Poland, Professor Kimmel moved to New York, where he spent eight years at the Sloan-Kettering Institute. He collaborated with biologists and statisticians on a range of issues, including screening for cancer, action of anticancer drugs on cells in vitro and in vivo, and dynamics of the cell cycle.

In recent years, mainly after coming to Rice in 1990, Professor Kimmel has been researching gene amplification and rapid evolution of DNA, including such related questions as sequence and linkage analysis. He is collaborating with biologists at the University of Texas Center for Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine and Rutgers University. The main biological problem of interest in this research is the creation and proliferation of repeat patterns in the genomes that are linked with human inherited disease and cancer. The mathematics used includes novel stochastic models of evolving DNA. Recently, these studies have gained importance and feasibility in connection with the Human Genome initiative.

Professor Kimmel coorganized four international meetings on Mathematical Population Dynamics and edited refereed collections of papers from these meetings (Arino, Axelrod and Kimmel, eds. [1992], Mathematical Population Dynamics, Dekker, New York, 730 pp.) He is currently preparing monographs on cell populations and on applied branching processes.

Professor Kimmel is also on the editorial boards of Mathematical Biosciences, Journal of Theoretical Biology, Journal of Biological Systems, Cell Proliferation and Nonlinear World.