Introduction

I hold a joint professorship in both the Mathematics Institute and the Department of Biological Sciences. My main area of interest is mathematical models of infectious diseases -- how they can be used and improved. My research group has been funded from a variety of sources including: BBSRC, EPSRC, Leverhulme Trust, NIH, NIH MIDAS, The Royal Society and The Wellcome Trust.

Research Interests

My research focuses on the three E's: Epidemiology, Evolution and Ecology. I am particularly interested in how spatial structure, heterogeneities and stochasticity affect the emergent population-level dynamics; as such my work uses a wide range of modelling tools and concepts. While large-scale simulations do play a substantial role in my work, I'm also very keen to develop simple modelling techniques that can capture the important dynamics of a system. The lists below give a flavour of my interests:

Epidemiology: Foot-and-mouth disease, Avian influenza, Measles, Whooping cough & other childhood infections, Bovine tuberculosis, Smallpox, Within-host immunological dynamics.

Evolution: Disease evolution,

Ecology: Bacteria-phage interactions, spatial habit-use.

Techniques: Pair-wise correlation models, Moment-closure approximations, Meta-population models, Kolmorgorov Forward Equations.

Publications & Achievements

Prizes.

Advisory Memberships.

Member of the government's scientific advisory group on foot-and-mouth (2001) .
Member of the G8 scientific advisory meeting on smallpox modelling (2002).
Member of Science Advisory Council, Exotic Diseases committee (2004-2005).
Member of Academic Advisory Panel for the DTI CBRN initiative (2004- ).
Wellcome Trust, Basic Infection and Immunity Panel (2004-2007).

Editorial duties.

Major Editor, Theoretical Population Biology (2003- )
Editor, American Naturalist (2004-2007)