540F Rowland Hall
University of California Irvine
Irvine, CA 92697
(949) 824-5530
qnie@uci.edu
Ph.D., Ohio State University, 1995
B.S., Wuhan University, China, 1988
Dr. Nie’s research area is mathematical and computational biology. His early work was on computer simulations and analysis of mechanics in bubbles, drops, binary alloys, and turbulence. Since 2001, Dr. Nie uses modeling and data-driven approach to investigate embryonic development, stem cells, and gene regulatory networks. Through close collaboration with biologists, Dr. Nie and his research team have discovered critical roles of feedbacks in tissue regeneration driven by stem cells, uncovered novel functions of noise that can benefit cells in making the correct decisions, identified key mechanisms responsible for the robust morphogenesis during development, and developed powerful multi-scale and stochastic models and computational tools that have many applications.
Dr. Nie has been instrumental in developing the area of systems biology at UCI. He is the associate director of a National Center of Excellence on Systems Biology funded by NIH since 2007, the director of an innovative gateway PhD program on Mathematical and Computational Biology that spans five different schools at UCI, and the director of the Center for Mathematical and Computational Biology in School of Physical Sciences.
Dr. Nie was a UCI Chancellor Fellow during 2005-2008. He is a Fellow of America Association for the Advancement of Science and a Fellow of American Physical Society.