Ratnasingham Shivaji

H. Barton Excellence Professor

Fellow of the American Mathematical Society

Office

Petty 148

Education

Research

Member of the Research Group(s): Applied Math, Mathematical Biology
Current Students: Melissa Glass (Ph.D.)
Former Students: Dustin Nichols (Ph.D. 2024), Alketa Henderson (Ph.D. 2024), Ananta Acharya (Ph.D. 2023) Amila Muthunayake (Ph.D. 2021), Nalin Fonseka (Ph.D. 2020), Mohan Mallick (Ph.D. 2019), Quinn Morris (Ph.D. 2017), Byungjae Son (Ph.D. 2017), Dagny Butler (Ph.D. 2014), Lakshmi Sankar (Ph.D. 2013), Eunkyung Ko (Ph.D. 2012), Sarath Sasi (Ph.D. 2012), Jerome Goddard II (Ph.D. 2011), Jinglong Ye (Ph.D. 2009), Jaffar Ali (Ph.D. 2008), Scott Caldwell (Ph.D. 2003), Shobha Oruganti (Ph.D. 2002), Maya Chhetri (Ph.D. 1999), Anuradha Vishwanathan (Ph.D. 1994), Eun Kyoung Lee (Postdoc. 2007 – 2009)

Research Interests: Study of non-negative solutions to steady-state reaction-diffusion equations arising in the modeling of natural phenomena including ecology and combustion theory. Recent results focus on singular problems, nonlinear diffusion, and nonlinear boundary conditions.

Courses Taught

• MAT 396 Calculus C
• MAT 735 Ordinary Differential Equations

Brief Biography

Ratnasingham Shivaji joined the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) as Head in July 2011 and served in this position until July 2019. Since January 2012, he is also serving as H. Barton Excellence Professor. Prior to joining UNCG, he served for twenty-six years at Mississippi State University (MSU), where he was honored as a W.L. Giles Distinguished Professor. He received his Ph.D. in Mathematics from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1981 and his B.S (first-class honors and special degree in mathematics) from the University of Sri Lanka in 1977. Shivaji’s area of specialization is partial differential equations, and in particular, nonlinear elliptic boundary value problems. His research work has applications in combustion theory, chemical reactor theory, and population dynamics, and has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Simon’s Foundation. Currently, he is serving as the PI on an NSF Math Ecology grant. To date, he has authored one hundred ninety research papers. He was honored as a Fellow of the American Mathematical Society (AMS) for research contributions, mentoring, and leadership. He is the recipient of the 2020 Mathematical Association of America (MAA) Southeastern Section Award for Distinguished University Teaching of Mathematics and the 2024 Conference of Southern Graduate Schools Outstanding Mentor Award. He is a member of the Editorial Board of several mathematics journals. To date, he has directed one postdoctoral student, twenty Ph.D. students (19 graduates, 1 current), sixteen M.S. graduates, and thirty-six undergraduate research students (30 past, 6 current).