Postgraduate Seminar Series – Computational Biology Theme hosted by Andrew Keniry, Nadia Davidson, Haloom Rafehi

Professor James McCaw

Professor in Mathematical Biology

School of Mathematics and Statistics & Melbourne School of Population and Global Health

The University of Melbourne

Infectious disease modelling

 

Davis Auditorium

Join via TEAMS

Including Q&A session

James McCaw is Professor of Mathematical Biology at the University of Melbourne. His primary area of expertise is infectious disease dynamics, with research programs at both the within-host and epidemiological scales. He obtained his PhD in theoretical physics from the University of Melbourne in 2006. Since 2015 has held a split appointment between the School of Mathematics and Statistics and Melbourne School of Population and Global Health.

His research in mathematical biology focuses on host-pathogen interactions and within-host dynamics, with research projects in influenza virus dynamics, the immune response to influenza, and malaria infection dynamics.

His research in infectious diseases epidemiology has been fundamental to Australia’s planning and response to pandemics, including the COVID-19 pandemic. Since 2005 he has worked closely with the Commonwealth government to apply techniques from applied mathematics and data science to support pandemic preparedness. During the COVID-19 pandemic he held a leadership role, supporting a team of applied mathematicians, epidemiologists, statisticians and biologists providing model-based and advance-analytics advice on COVID-19 to government. He sat on the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee as an invited expert from January 2020 to May 2022 and is an invited expert member of the Communicable Diseases Network of Australia.

In this seminar, James will introduce the foundational mathematical models for both within-host viral dynamics and epidemiological transmission dynamics and discuss their role in scientific discovery, epidemiological analytics and public health.

All welcome!