Welcome to the website of the Edinburgh – Göttingen collaboration on statistical mechanical theories of emergence in biological systems. Founded in 2020, the aim of this collaboration is to bring research activities together and capitalize on shared interests and expertise for collaboration.
Research areas
Applying the toolbox of statistical mechanics to current problems in biophysics and systems biology, we are particularly interested in the following research areas:
Behaviour of active particles
The behaviour of active particles, with activity arising from propulsion, interaction, growth or e.g. resetting in search processes
Gene regulation and evolution
The interaction of gene regulation or evolution with physical motion
Phase separation
Phase separation with active processes including active motion or chemical reactions
Project examples
Specific examples of complementary research approaches include
- The steady-state behaviour of active particles, which is being tackled in lattice approaches (Blythe, Evans in Edinburgh) and lattice particle simulations and continuum theory (Sollich, Golestanian in Göttingen)
- The origin and nature of heterogeneities in bacterial evolution, where scaling and continuum approaches (Klumpp, Bittihn in Göttingen) complement large-scale molecular dynamics (Waclaw in Edinburgh)
- Pattering and fluctuations of interfaces with active processes, where growth models (Marenduzzo in Edinburgh) provide microscopic complements to coarse-grained theories (Zwicker in Göttingen)