Michael Bleher

Hi, I’m a Postdoc based at the Institute for Mathematics, Heidelberg University, and associated with STRUCTURES and the ERC Grant Perpetuating Stemness.

I obtained a PhD in Mathematical Physics on connections between topologically twisted supersymmetric field theories, Floer theories, and knot homologies under the supervision of Johannes Walcher.

Currently I’m investigating applications of geometry and topology in biology, with the ultimate goal of extracting dynamical information from single cell RNA velocity data during cell differentiation. This research is part of the Applied Analysis and Modelling in Biosciences group of Anna Marciniak-Czochra and developed in collaboration with Anna Wienhard at the MPI MiS.

In general, I’m fascinated by the unreasonable effectiveness of abstract mathematics in the natural sciences and vice versa. I’m always happy to chat about new examples and am looking forward to seeing Wigner being proven right again and again.

A much more difficult and confusing situation would arise if we could, some day, establish a theory of the phenomena of consciousness, or of biology, which would be as coherent and convincing as our present theories of the inanimate world. – Eugene Wigner