About me
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I am a complex-systems physicist working on spreading processes at the boundary between statistical physics and epidemiology. Trained as a civil and process engineer at the Universidad de Chile, I moved to Göttingen for a PhD in physics with Viola Priesemann at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, where I studied the interplay between information, risk perception and the spread of COVID-19, and stayed on as a postdoc leading the group's Infectious Disease Modeling (“MIBSTI”) team, working on behaviour and sexually transmitted infections. Since 2026 I am Associate Professor at the International Research Center for Complexity Sciences of Beihang University (H3I, Hangzhou), where I lead the Complex Epidemics lab, and External Member of IMMIDD at the University of Münster. I code in Julia, and I play the piano and sing when I am not modelling.
Positions
| Date | Position |
|---|---|
| since 2026 | Associate Professor (Tenure-Track) International Research Center for Complexity Sciences, Hangzhou International Innovation Institute (H3I), Beihang University, China Lead of the Complex Epidemics lab |
| since 2026 | External Member Interdisciplinary Center for Mathematical Modeling of Infectious Disease Dynamics (IMMIDD), University of Münster, Germany |
| 2023 – 2025 | Postdoctoral Researcher, Priesemann Group Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization and Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany Lead of the Infectious Disease Modeling “MIBSTI” Team |
| 2020 – 2023 | Doctoral Researcher, MPRG Priesemann Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Göttingen, Germany |
| 2016 – 2020 | Research Assistant and Predoctoral Researcher Centre for Biotechnology and Bioengineering (CeBiB), Universidad de Chile |
Education
| Date | Institution |
|---|---|
| 2020 – 2023 | Dr. rer. nat. in Physics International Max Planck Research School “Physics of Biological and Complex Systems”, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany Thesis: Complex Dynamics in the Spread of COVID-19 |
| 2017 – 2019 | Master of Science in Process Engineering Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile |
| 2012 – 2017 | Civil Engineering (Diplom) Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile |
Recognition
| Date | Recognition |
|---|---|
| 2025 | Best doctoral dissertation in theoretical physics, University of Göttingen (Dr. Berliner – Dr. Ungewitter – Stiftung) |
| 2020 | Best Graduate 2019, Colegio de Ingenieros de Chile |
| 2018 | Outstanding student, Master’s Program, FCFM, Universidad de Chile |
Editorial work
- Editorial Board Member, Scientific Reports (Nature Portfolio); Founding Editorial Board Member, Scientific Reviews.
- Referee for Nature Communications, Communications Medicine, Communications Physics, Journal of Translational Medicine, PLoS Computational Biology, BMC Bioinformatics, BMC Infectious Diseases, Computers in Biology and Medicine, IEEE Communications Magazine, Heliyon, Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Frontiers in Medicine, among others.
Teaching
| Date | Course |
|---|---|
| since 2022 | Georg-August-Universität Göttingen — Lecturer / Teaching Assistant Spreading Processes and Learning in Living Systems (BSc, lecturer) · Current Topics in Theoretical Physics (MSc, lecturer) · Introduction to Physics of Complex Systems (MSc, TA) |
| 2013 – 2019 | Universidad de Chile — Lecturer / Teaching Assistant Ordinary Differential Equations (undergraduate, ~100 students per semester) · Mathematical Methods in Engineering and Non-Newtonian Fluid Dynamics (PhD programmes) |
Selected talks
| Year | Talk |
|---|---|
| 2026 | Invited speaker, 17th Dynamical Systems applied to Biology and Natural Sciences (DSABNS), Granada, Spain |
| 2025 | Invited speaker, STATPHYS29 satellite meeting “Complexity of Living Systems”, Palermo, Italy — Testing as an active intervention to control epidemics |
| 2025 | Organiser of the mini-symposium Complex dynamics and control in behaviour-driven epidemics, 16th DSABNS, Naples, Italy |
| 2024 | Lecturer, CLIMADEMIC Summer School, Berlin — Mathematical models of infectious disease spread |
| 2023 | Invited speaker, CASUS workshop Data science and the COVID-19 pandemic, Görlitz, Germany — Mechanics of pandemics |