Kathleen Curtius

Dr. Kathleen Curtius is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of California San Diego (UCSD), affiliated with the Division of Biomedical Informatics and the UCSD Moores Cancer Center. She leads the Quantitative Cancer Control laboratory, focusing on early cancer detection and prevention through mathematical modeling and multi-scale data analysis. Previously, she held a Medical Research Council Rutherford Fellowship at Barts Cancer Institute (London) and completed postdoctoral training in Prof. Trevor Graham's lab. Her research integrates applied mathematics, computational biology, and clinical oncology to address cancer evolution and screening strategies.

Education:

• PhD in Applied Mathematics, University of Washington (2015)
• MS in Applied Mathematics, University of Washington (2011)
• BS in Mathematics, UCLA (2010)

Research Interests:

• Mathematical oncology
• Cancer evolution modeling
• Epigenetic drift analysis
• Screening optimization
• Multiscale tumor dynamics

Her work bridges disciplines to develop predictive tools for early cancer detection and personalized surveillance strategies.

Publications: Recent work includes studies on metagenomic data bias (Nature Communications 2025), AI-driven cancer biomarker discovery (JCI Insight 2022), and computational models of Barrett's esophagus progression (Gut 2020). Her research emphasizes translational applications in clinical oncology and public health.

Awards: Recognized with the 2024 Leah Edelstein-Keshet Prize, 2022 AGA Research Scholar Award, and 2018 MRC Rutherford Fellowship. Her work has been cited over 1,000 times across key oncology journals.

Funding: Principal Investigator on NIH grants (R01CA270235, I01BX005958) supporting projects on Barrett's esophagus modeling and colitis-associated colorectal cancer surveillance optimization. Collaborates with clinicians, geneticists, and computational biologists to advance cancer control efforts.

Labs/Teams: Leads the Quantitative Cancer Control Lab at UCSD, part of the Bioinformatics and Systems Biology division. Active in interdisciplinary initiatives like the Moores Cancer Center's Cancer Control Program.