Kevin R. Pilkiewicz, Ph.D.

Research Physical Scientist

Dr. Pilkiewicz received his bachelor’s in chemistry and physics and his master’s in chemistry from Harvard University, graduating summa cum laude. He went on to receive his doctorate in chemistry from Stanford University under the tutelage of Dr. Hans Andersen. After spending three years doing postdoctoral work with Dr. Joel Eaves of the University of Colorado Boulder, he joined the EGSB team in 2015, bringing along his wealth of experience deriving mathematical models for complex soft and condensed matter systems across physics and biology. As a member of the EGSB team, Dr. Pilkiewicz’s research has recently focused on the study of information flow in bacterial transcriptional networks, the impact of attention mechanisms on animal flocking, and the underlying reaction-diffusion dynamics of microtubule self-assembly; but his strong background in fundamental physics and mathematics enables him to continually expand the boundaries of his locus of expertise to encompass an increasingly diverse range of subjects.

Research:

Information theory, active soft matter, molecular communication, collective motion

Selected Publications

  1. K. R. Pilkiewicz and M. L. Mayo, Magnetic induction inspires a schematic theory for crosstalk-driven relaxation dynamics in cells. Phys. Rev. E, 103(4), 042417 (2021).
  2. M. A. Rowland, K. R. Pilkiewicz, and M. L. Mayo, Devil in the details: Mechanistic variations impact information transfer across models of transcriptional cascades. Plos one, 16(1), e0245094 (2021).
  3. K. R. Pilkiewicz et al., Decoding collective communications using information theory tools. J. Roy. Soc. Interface, 17(164), 20190563 (2020).
  4. E. Barnes, X. Guan, E. M. Alberts, T. L. Thornell, C. M. Warner, and K. R. Pilkiewicz, Interplay between convective and viscoelastic forces controls the morphology of in vitro paclitaxel-stabilized microtubules. Crystals, 10(1), 43 (2020).
  5. K. R. Pilkiewicz, P. Rana, M.  L. Mayo,  and P. Ghosh, Molecular communication and cellular signaling from an information-theory perspective. In Nanoscale Networking and Communications Handbook (pp. 235-257), CRC Press (2019).
  6. P. Rana, K. R. Pilkiewicz, M. L. Mayo, and P. Ghosh, Benchmarking the communication fidelity of biomolecular signaling cascades featuring pseudo-one-dimensional transport. AIP Advances, 8(5), 055220 (2018).
  7. K. R. Pilkiewicz and M. L. Mayo, Fluctuation sensitivity of a transcriptional signaling cascade. Phys. Rev. E 94, 032412 (2016).
  8. C. Price, K. R. Pilkiewicz, T. G. W. Graham, D. Song, J. D. Eaves, and J. J. Loparo, DNA Motion Capture Reveals the Mechanical Properties of DNA at the Mesoscale. Biophysical Journal 108, 2532-2540 (2015).
  9. K. R. Pilkiewicz and J. D. Eaves, Reentrance in an active glass mixture. Soft Matter 10, 7495-7501 (2014).
  10. K. R. Pilkiewicz and H. C. Andersen, A diagrammatic kinetic theory of density fluctuations in simple liquids in the overdamped limit. I. A long time scale theory for high density. J. Chem. Phys. 140, 154506 (2014).
  11. K. R. Pilkiewicz and H. C. Andersen, A diagrammatic kinetic theory of density fluctuations in simple liquids in the overdamped limit. II. The one-loop approximation. J. Chem. Phys. 140, 154507 (2014).
  12. K. R. Pilkiewicz and J. D. Eaves, Flocking with minimal cooperativity: The panic model. Phys. Rev. E 89, 012718 (2014).