Julie Simons Department of Mathematics University of Wisconsin, Madison Office: 318 Van Vleck Email: simons@math.wisc.edu Phone: 608.263.3239

Teaching: This fall I am teaching sections 304 and 305 of Calculus 211.

Research interests: I am currently working with the BACTER Institute on biological modeling and my advisor is Paul Milewski. My research is mainly concerned with multiscale modeling of chemotaxis in Rhodobacter sphaeroides. R. sphaeroides is known for its photosynthetic pathway, which might provide insight into alternative energy sources, as well as its metal reduction capabilities. The potential for bioremediation use of this species makes it not only interesting but also perhaps very helpful for the future of our energy resources and environment. Much modeling of bacteria has been done on E. coli and I am working to extend these types of models to R. sphaeroides , which is significantly more complicated in its chemotaxis mechanism than E. coli.

Who am I? I am a fifth year applied math grad student at UW-Madison. I graduated with a B.A. in pure mathematics and a minor in statistics from U.C. Berkeley in May 2004. I grew up in Boulder, Colorado and my interests outside of math are varied: I like salsa dancing, karaoke, cooking, playing piano, hiking, [road] biking, running, 80s music, football, theme parties, traveling, and anything that will make me laugh. Some more pictures ...