Aida Maraj © Katrin Boes / MPI-CBG
In September, Aida Maraj, a mathematician, started at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) as a new research group leader. She will be located at the Center for Systems Biology Dresden (CSBD), leading the “Algebra in Data Analysis” research group. With her research group, Aida will investigate statistical questions through the lens of algebra, geometry and combinatorics, and develop new math motivated by this perspective.
“My work is in an interdisciplinary area called algebraic statistics. Some models arrive from phylogenetics or can be used to model data from biology.” says Aida Maraj. “Mathematics is a new part at the MPI-CBG and CSBD. I see it as a privilege to build new things here together with my colleagues. ”
Welcome to the institute, Aida!
Aida studied mathematics at the University of Tirana in Albania and moved in 2015 to the University of Kentucky, USA, for her PhD in Mathematics with a thesis on Algebraic and Geometric properties of Hierarchical Models. In 2020 she went to Leipzig as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max-Planck-Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences. After a year, she moved back to the USA with postdoctoral positions at the University of Michigan and Harvard University before starting her position as research group leader in Dresden. Her research has been supported with grants by the American Mathematical Society and the National Science Foundation.