Pathum Nawarathna is a Ph.D. candidate in Applied Mathematics with a Statistics emphasis at Missouri University of Science and Technology, and a Graduate Statistician certified by the American Statistical Association. He earned his B.Sc. in Statistics and Operations Research from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. He is a statistician driven by the intersection of rigorous methodology and real-world biological problems.
His doctoral research focuses on QTL mapping in multiparental mouse populations, where he develops novel statistical frameworks to identify genetic modifiers of Down Syndrome phenotypes. He is currently supporting NIH-funded research on Down Syndrome co-occurring conditions, collaborating closely with biologists and geneticists at Indiana University. He is passionate about building reproducible, computationally efficient analysis pipelines that bridge statistics and the life sciences.
Alongside his research, Pathum has extensive teaching experience and has served as Instructor of Record for introductory statistics courses at the undergraduate level. He is committed to fostering student engagement through active learning approaches and believes in making quantitative concepts accessible to all learners.
