Dr. Amin Doostmohammadi

“For his groundbreaking contributions applying the concepts of active matter physics and topological defects in biological contexts.”

Amin Doostmohammadi is the first Novo Nordisk Foundation Assistant Professorship at the Niels Bohr Institute and is the leader of the Active Intelligent Matter Research Group. He also has a cross-appointment as a Specially Appointed Assistant Professor at the Department of Bioengineering in Osaka University, Japan. Amin completed his undergraduate education in Engineering at University of Tehran, and obtained his Masters and PhD degrees from University of Notre Dame. Before joining NBI, Amin held a highly prestigious Royal 1851 Research Fellowship at Oxford University’s Rudolph Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics.

Amin works at the exciting interface between physics and biology, modeling systems as diverse as swimming bacteria, molecular motors and tissue dynamics, with focus on biological processes such as mechanotransduction and collective cell migration. His lab has now also initiated an experimental programme at the Niels Bohr Institute. The main focus is on developing a suit of theoretical and computational models, along with well-designed experiments to lead innovative and collaborative projects in biophysics: of particular note Amin’s works have introduced the notions of division-induced activity, defect-mediated morphologies, and has further uncovered a mechanical route towards cell death and subsequent cell extrusion from tissues with applications to tissue regeneration and metastasis suppression.