Biological Physics 
 Theory and Computation

Our group explores the basic physics underlying a variety of biological processes ranging in scale from protein function at the molecular level to the collective motility of cells and organisms.  We use theoretical methods from statistical mechanics, polymer physics and elasticity as well as simulation techniques including molecular dynamics, coarse grained Brownian dynamics, Monte Carlo simulations and agent based models . We also work in close collaboration with experimentalists and other theorists, many of who are part of our NSF funded Center for Cellular and Biomolecular Machines. Our research spans three broad areas:

   Cell Shape Regulation from Cytoskeletal Structure and Dynamics
Both bacterial and eukaryotic cells need to maintain control of their shape which affects function. How do cells exploit the intrinsic structure and dynamics of cytoskeletal filaments to measure, maintain and change shape ?
​
Intracellular Transport
Material is continuously transported between organelles within our cells by the action of molecular motors dragging cargo on a network of protein filaments. How does the composition of the cargo, co-operation between motors and the topology of the  road network affect transport? What does this tell us about disease states where transport is disrupted?

Collective Motion
Collective motion is exploited at many scales ranging from flocks of birds to groups of migrating cells involved in development, wound healing or cancer. How does individual variability among the collective, as in clusters of malignant cancer cells, allow for novel physical phases, enhanced load sharing and transport?



 LATEST NEWS:

Ankush wins a Physics Summer Fellowship and Nolan is awarded a Fall CCBM Fellowship! Congrats Ankush and Nolan!
​
Suraj passes his qualifying exam! Congrats Suraj!
​
Grateful to receive an Excellence in Faculty Mentoring award from the UCM Senate! Thanks to our amazing junior faculty for the nomination.

Excited to lead a new NSF REU Site at UC Merced on Interdisciplinary Biological Sciences and Engineering [news]
​
Joey's paper published in Science Advances! Congrats Joey!

Patrick's paper published in PNAS! Congrats Patrick!

​Niranjan is off to UPenn and Farnaz and Imtiaz are moving onto the University of Chicago. Good luck!

Niranjan, Farnaz and Imtiaz all graduate with their Ph.D.s! Congrats!

Niranjan wins the Graduate Deans Dissertation Fellowship from Graduate Division. Congrats Niranjan!

Organizing an APS 2023 Focus Session on Intracellular Transport w/ Lena Koslover (UCSD)

EARLIER HIGHLIGHTS:

AG elected to Chair line of American Physical Society Division of Biological Physics (DBIO) [news]

CCBM Phase 2 funded for 5 years/ $5 million! AG and Victor Munoz (BioE) will continue as co-directors.

New paper on entropy driven translocation of disordered proteins with K.C. Huang group in Nature Microbiology [story]!

Excited to start the NIH G-RISE (T-32) graduate training program as director[news]

UC MRPI grant to establish UC Coronavirus Research Consortium [news]

Joined STC CEMB to study collective cell migration

AG elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (DBIO) [news]

Katie's paper on frustration in migrating cell clusters published in Science Advances! [news story]

Aspen Public Radio interview

Started as Chair of Physics Department (July 1 2018)

NSF Grant on "Modeling Transport in Complex Intracellular Environments" is funded!

Our Center for Cellular and Biomolecular Machines (CCBM) is funded by NSF for 5 years and $5 million! AG and Victor Munoz (BioE) will serve as co-directors. [UCM story] [Merced Sun Star story]

Aspen TV interview on "The Physics of Flocking and Swarming"

AG has been named a Scialog Fellow by the Research Corporation and Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation (July 2014)