Rakesh Chatterjee

Welcome to my personal webpage. It is a kind of my elaborated CV. Currently I am a Scientific Assistant at the Chair of Mathematics in LifeSciences, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), Germany and also affiliated to the newly formed Max-Planck-Zentrum für Physik und Medizin. 

My research is focused on the statistical properties of models far from equilibrium as means of understanding complex biological phenomena. I construct simple models that capture the physical mechanisms involved and then analyse them through analytical theory and numerical simulation. My scholarly interests range broadly in non-equilibrium statistical physics of active systems and clearly shaping towards the applications in biology. Statistical physics deals with the formation of structures in the macroscopic world due to interactions between their constituent particles and describes how the microscopic entities produce macroscopic phenomena. Starting from Ph.D I have worked on various statistical physics problems, e.g., low dimensional driven and diffusive models, particle systems driven by time periodic forces in 1D etc. Recently I have also worked on soft matter related problems, e.g., collective phenomenon of non-convex active particles, glassy dynamics, arrested states, microemulsion system and numerical modeling of synthetic biological experiments. Recent experiments revealed that, cells in dense biological tissues exhibit many characteristics of glassy materials, including arrested states and dynamical heterogeneities. In a lattice based model we have shown that when density is dynamically increased, the route to the optimal packing is frustrated and the system gets arrested in a lower-density disordered glassy phase. Earlier during my research career, I have also contributed to a related field, investigating critical dynamics in complex systems. We have considered stock market data as a dynamical system to investigate the correlation patterns from the time series analysis to get any precursor for critical market state. To understand the statistical behaviour of the financial market and its constituent sectors, typically the information of co-movements and correlations among the stocks of the market are considered.

My current research projects are aiming to understand the interplay of the transcriptional activity in chromatin organisation and phase separation behaviour of DNA oligo-based nano-motifs.