Tosif Ahamed

Assistant Professor

Phone: Will be updated shortly
E-mail: tosif@iisc.ac.in
Website: tosifahamed.github.io

Research Interests:

Data-driven modeling of biological dynamics; dynamical systems theory; operator-theoretic methods; artificial intelligence and machine learning; developmental biology and gene regulation

My research develops mathematical and computational methods for data-driven modeling of biological processes, with a focus on systems neuroscience and developmental biology. The core theme is the inverse problem at the heart of modern biology: given high-dimensional measurements from a biological system, how can we infer the mathematical principles and biophysical mechanisms governing its behavior? Drawing on dynamical systems theory, operator-theoretic methods, and artificial intelligence, I build scalable and efficient tools to make this inference tractable.

 

Educational History

Theory Fellow — Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), Janelia Research Campus, Ashburn, VA, USA (2023–2026)

Postdoctoral Fellow — Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute, Mount Sinai Hospital, and Department of Physiology, University of Toronto, Canada (2020–2023)

Ph.D., Theoretical Biophysics — Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) Graduate University, Japan (2019)

M.Sc., Neural Computation — School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, U.K. (2011)

B.E., Computer Science & Engineering — Army Institute of Technology, University of Pune, India (2008)

Courses offered

Will be updated shortly.

Awards / Honours / Affiliations

  • Theory Fellowship, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), Janelia Research Campus, 2022–2026.
  • Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) DC2 Research Fellowship, 2017–2018.

Publications

  • Meng, J., Ahamed, T.†, Yu, B., Hung, W., El Mouridi, S., Wang, Z., Zhang, Y., Wen, Q., Boulin, T., Gao, S., & Zhen, M. (2024). A tonically active master neuron modulates mutually exclusive motor states at two timescales. Science Advances, 10(15), eadk0002. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adk0002
  • Ahamed, T.*, Lu, Y.*, Mulcahy, B., Meng, J., Witvliet, D., Guan, S. A., Holmyard, D., Hung, W., Wen, Q., Chisholm, A. D., Samuel, A. D. T., & Zhen, M. (2022). Extrasynaptic signaling enables an asymmetric juvenile motor circuit to produce symmetric undulation. Current Biology, 32(21), 4631–4644. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.09.002
  • Ahamed, T.*, Costa, A. C., & Stephens, G. J. (2021). Capturing the continuous complexity of behaviour in Caenorhabditis elegans. Nature Physics, 17(2), 275–283. (F1000 recommended; featured in Nature Physics News & Views.) https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-020-01036-8
  • Ahamed, T.*†, Kawanabe, M., Ishii, S., & Callan, D. E. (2014). Structural differences in gray matter between glider pilots and non-pilots: a voxel-based morphometry study. Frontiers in Neurology, 5, 248. https://doi.org/10.3389/fneur.2014.00248