Helen Wilson

Helen Jane Wilson, (born 1973), is a British mathematician and the first female Head of Mathematics at University College London (UCL). Her research focuses on the theoretical and numerical modelling of the flow of non-Newtonian fluids such as polymeric materials and particle suspensions. Early life and education Wilson was born in Warrington. Her father, Leslie Knight Wilson was a chartered accountant; her mother, Brenda (née Naylor) a French teacher. She attended Broomfields Junior School and Bridgewater High School. Wilson studied at Clare College, Cambridge, completing a BA, Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics (later converted to an MMath) and PhD in mathematics. Her PhD thesis, titled "Shear Flow Instabilities in Viscoelastic Fluids", was supervised by John Rallison. On graduation she moved to the University of Colorado at Boulder, where she began research on suspension mechanics with Rob Davis in the Chemical Engineering department. Mathematical work In 2000 Wilson returned to the UK to take up a lectureship in Applied Mathematics at the University of Leeds. In 2004 she moved to UCL, where she is Professor of Applied Mathematics and as of September 2018, Head of Department. Wilson is the first female to hold the position of Head of Mathematics at UCL.