Faculty Directory
Linlin Su
- Visiting Assistant Professor, Mathematical Sciences
Population genetics studies the genetic diversity of a particular species. It describes the genetic signature of a particular group by searching for patterns from a mathematical standpoint. It helps understand how the collective genetic diversity of a population influences the health of individuals within the population. Many natural populations are distributed geographically and mate at random locally. Therefore, it is important to investigate the spatial patterns in gene frequencies as the consequences of migration and selection. I study the evolution of gene frequencies under the joint action of migration and selection through differential equation models. I use theories of differential equations, functional analysis, and numerical simulations in studying these mathematical models. The mathematical results are crucial to predict the long-term genetic makeup of a population and helpful to understand the advance of the advantageous genes. I enjoy working at WPI for its small size so that it is easy for people to get to know each other and communicate with each other. It is a lot of fun to talk with students from different part of the nation and from all over the world. I enjoy teaching my students and also learning from them.
Research Interests
- Applied Mathematics
- Mathematical Biology
- Population Genetics
- Partial Differential Equations
- Reaction-Diffusion Equations
Education
- BS, Tsinghua University, 2002
- MS, Tsinghua University, 2005
- PhD, University of Minnesota, 2010
Featured Publications
- Patterns for Four-allele Population Genetics Model, with Roger Lui, accepted for publication in Theoretical Population Biology.
- An indefinite nonlinear diffusion problem in population genetics, I: existence and limiting profiles, with Kimie Nakashima and Wei-Ming Ni, Discrete Contin. Dyn. Syst. - Series A. 27 (2010), 617–641.
- An indefinite nonlinear diffusion problem in population genetics, II: stability and multiplicity, with Yuan Lou and Wei-Ming Ni, Discrete Contin. Dyn. Syst. - Series A. 27 (2010), 643–655.
- Lagrangian spheres in the 2-dimensional complex space forms, with Haizhong Li and Hui Ma, Israel J. Math. 166 (2008), 113–124.
- The gaps in the spectrum of the Schrodinger operator, with Haizhong Li, PDEs, submanifolds and affine differential geometry, 91–102, Banach Center Publ., 69, Polish Acad. Sci., Warsaw, 2005.
