Research summary
The main interest of my group is to study the function of microdomains in cellular biology and to develop physical modeling and mathematical analysis. Our goal is to identify principles underlying cellular and network function in normal and pathological conditions. For that purpose, in collaboration with experimental groups, we aim to answer basic questions in cellular biology such as what defines trafficking in cells, how cells respond to stimuli, what makes viral particles optimal in trafficking. We are currently working on modeling the nuclear organization, cytoplasmic viral trafficking and synapses.
In the field of applied mathematics and probability, using asymptotic analysis and Brownian simulations, we recently estimated the synaptic current at excitatory synapses and studied the effect of the cleft geometry, receptor trafficking and other factors.
Other projects concern sensor cells, such as photoreceptors, where we aim at building a complete model to better understand noise in cones and simulate the effect of various drugs such as viagra which affects the PDE enzyme activity.
We dedicate a large effort to develop physical and mathematical models and numerical simulations to study cellular properties from the molecular level. We mainly develop approaches inspired from statistical physics, partial differential equations, stochastic dynamical systems and simulations. In the past, by using asymptotic analysis, we computed the expansion of the mean time for a Brownian molecule to escape through a small hole located on a piece of a cell membrane (Narrow escape problem). This computation defines the forward binding rate of chemical reactions occurring in microdomains.
Key words
Fields: Computational Biology, Applied Mathematics, Modeling, Asymptotic analysis, Applied Probability, Partial Differential Equations, Mathematical Biology, Computational Neuroscience, Physical Virology, Phototransduction, Polymer Modeling, Data Analysis of single particle trajectory, Neuron-glia interactions, Nuclear Organization.
Sub-Fields: Diffusion, Cell Geometry, Brownian Motion, Narrow Escape Time, Dire Strait Time, Asymptotic methods, Mean First Passage Time, PDE, Aggregation-Dissociation, modeling telomere organization, Molecular and Vesicular Trafficking, Synaptic Transmission, Brownian Simulations, Early Steps of Viral Infection, Neurite outgrowth.
More about our research:
- Booklet-Holcman-group