News
A Lot of Great News
Posted by Paul Macklin
8 June 2007 at 3:11 PM PDT (UTC +?)
I've had a lot of great news over the past few days. On Wednesday, June 6th, the Department of Mathematics awarded the Outstanding Ph.D. Dissertation award to Evelyn Lunasin-Manalo and me. I'm trully surprised, thrilled, and honored, because we graduated 10 Ph.D.s with quality dissertations this year. The department also surprised me a with a service award (shared with Nick Alexander for co-founding the mathematics graduate student colloquium (MGSC)) and a teaching/research award (shared with Nick Alexander and Timothy Choi). I'm truly flattered and grateful, and I hope that as an alum that I can make you all proud!
Continuing along the "life is good" theme, I received and accepted my offer letter to work at University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston as an assistant professor under Vittorio Cristini. I'll be working in the School of Health Information Sciences, along with the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center to develop next-generation mathematical and computational models of cancer. I'm very excited at the opportunity to work side-by-side with some of the greatest cancer biologists and oncologists in the world, and the integrated/interdisciplinary aspects are thrilling.
So, life is good. :-) -- Paul
Dissertation Finished and Submitted
Posted by Paul Macklin
1 June 2007 at 10:40 AM PDT (UTC +?)
Well, I just traded 2 × 220 heavy pages of dissertation for a single sheet that reads "dissertation manuscript accepted" Whew, what a relief! It's finally done, and the degree should be official in a few days.
It's been an interesting 24 hours or so. I had a burst of energy and motivation around 1:00 this morning, so I decided to print out all the black and white pages of my dissertation on the laser writer at home. At last seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, I filled out all the forms and schlepped myself over to Kinko's at 8 this morning to print the remaining color pages. After spending another hour double-checking the manuscripts, I headed to the University Archives, and that was that! Woohoo! :-)
In other great news, I've been having some great disussions with Vittorio Cristini on my position at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. I'm going to head there as an (non-tenure-track) assistant professor and do some interdisciplinary cancer modeling and simulation with the biologists and doctors there. I'm very excited!
Well, back to work on our joint paper for me. But once again, woohoo! :-) -- Paul
The Doctor is in!
Posted by Paul Macklin
15 May 2007 at 6:50 PM PDT (UTC +?)
I'm happy to announce that I passed my Ph.D. dissertation defense, and I hope to have my dissertation fully revised within a week or two. The defense was an interesting process with a lot of great (and difficult) questions, but on the whole, it went well, and I'm glad to be done with it.
Photo credit: Angela Macklin
I was really excited to see that many of my great friends were there to support me through the defense. I'm grateful to have so many good friendships here at UCI, and I think it also speaks to what a great community we've built here in the graduate program. Thanks to all who attended! Also, great thanks to Donna McConnell and the department staff who organized a delicious lunch and reception!
I'd like to also thank my committee for agreeing to take time out of their busy schedules to hold the defense today. In particular, I'd like to thank John Lowengrub for being such a great advisor and trusted friend over the past several years. Needless to day, I wouldn't even be here if it weren't for his dedication as an advisor.
I'm grateful for the emotional support I've received from my family and in-laws over the past few years. It has meant so much to me to always receive such encouragement through this long, difficult path.
Last but first, I'd like to thank my wife, Angela, for being so incredibly supportive over the years. She's heard so much about tumor growth, cancer, level set methods, and modeling over the past few years that she really deserves a Ph.D., too. :-) I'm grateful to have such a patient and supportive wife!
Photo credit: Baochi Nguyen
So, in summary, woohoo! And thanks to all the support I've received from friends and family over the past few years! -- Dr. Macklin (I just couldn't resist!)
Ph.D. Dissertation Complete!
Posted by Paul Macklin
7 May 2007 at 9:37 PM PDT (UTC +?)
I just finished my Ph.D. dissertation revisions and sent a copy to my committee. It's a little surreal, but I'm nearly done! :-) -- Paul
JSC Level Set/Ghost Cell Paper Submitted
Posted by Paul Macklin
7 May 2007 at 12:51 AM PDT (UTC +?)
John Lowengrub and I just submitted an invited paper for an upcoming special issue of the Journal of Scientific Computing on level set methods. I'm very excited! I'll update the publications page page shortly to reflect the change. -- Paul
