Knots are a part of nature. From pocketed headphones to carelessly packed garden hoses, they find ways to manifest in strings and loops. This isn’t just a truth of mathematics; it’s a truth of biology. In fact, DNA molecules can also get tied into knots.

At the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis, researchers are using the power of machine learning to help protect us from the next pandemic, discover and build new materials, and explore the myriad galaxies in the heavens above.

The study of our ever-shifting, tangle of a genome is called topology. Javier Arsuaga harnesses this area of mathematics in tandem with machine learning and computational modeling to investigate how diseases, like breast cancer, spread.

A mathematician working in the life sciences and an astrophysicist studying dark matter from the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis are among the recent cohort awarded Chancellor’s Fellowships for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. The fellowships recognize exceptional contributions in supporting, tutoring, mentoring and advising underrepresented students and/or students from underserved communities.