Jorge Velasco-Hernandez

I am a biologists working in Applied Mathematics at the interface where biological processes are understood, explained and dissected with the methodology of Mathematics. My interest since the very beginning of my carreer has been the incorporation of mathematics to the study of biological problems, a research program that I have continued to pursue to this date. After spending 20 years at the Biology and Mathematics Departments of the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana working in Theoretical and Mathematical Ecology and Epidemiology I moved recently to the Mexican Petroleum Institute (IMP) where I became Coordinator of the Program of Applied Mathematics and Computer Sciences. Within this Program I have my own research group composed of one posdoc, three Associate Research Scientists, three doctoral students and several undergraduates. At the IMP, as part of my personal research activities, I am dedicated to the integration and development of an Industrial Biomathematics Research Group centered in the study of two main lines of research on biological complex systems: (1) the mathematical study of function and structure of bacterial consortia and (2) the mathematical study of the population dynamics of computer viruses in networks.

At the Santa Fe Institute I would like to approach a subset of these lines from the perspective of a quantitative and mathematical framework to understand the complex phenomena that are associated with the structure and function of biological systems.

Last, I would like to say that I am a native from Mexico, from the State of Oaxaca, one of the richer states in Mexico\'s synchretic Indigenous and Spanish traditions both of which lines I have within my family. My wife Josefa and two children Hector Augusto and Laura Itandehui, my epsilon and my delta, respectively, share their beautiful lives with me. We spend every year living in Mexico City and visiting, as frequently as possible, Oaxaca and Ciudad Madero, Tamaulipas, where our beloved roots and families reside.

Published Research

Galileo Dominguez-Zacarias; Claudia P. Ferreira y Jorge X. Velasco-Hernandez. A mathematical model for the study of biofilm internal structure. Journal of theoretical Biology 233: 245-51, 2005

Erick Luna, G. Dominguez-Zacarias, Claudia P. Ferreira and Jorge X. Velasco-Hernandez. Detachment and difussive-convective transport in an evolving heterogeneous two-dimensional biofilm hybrid model. Physical Review E 70, 061909, 2004.

Ismael Velazquez, David Kaplan, Jorge X. Velasco-Hernandez, Sergio Navarrete. Multistability in an open recruitment food web model. Applied Mathematics and Computation 163, pp 275-294, 2005.

Julien Arino, Kenneth Cooke, Pauline van der Driessche and Jorge X. Velasco-Hernandez. An epidemiology model that includes vaccine efficacy and waning. Discrete and Continuous Dynamical Systems B, 4:491-507, 2004.

J. X. Velasco-Hernandez, H.B. Hersherngorn y S.Blower. Could widespread usage of combination antiretroviral therapy eradicate the HIV epidemics?. The Lancet Infectious Diseases 2: 487-493, 2002

Juan E. Keymer, Pablo A. Maquet. Jorge X. Velasco-Hernandez y Simon A. Levin. Extinction thresholds and metapopulation persistence in dynamic landscapes. The American Naturalist. 156: 478-494, 2000.