Rate My Professor Matthew Biesecker

Matthew Biesecker is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at South Dakota State University in Brookings, South Dakota. He holds a Ph.D. and conducts research in mathematical modeling, optimization, and calculus of variations. His work applies mathematical techniques to physical and biological systems, including solar cell technologies and cancer treatment modeling.

Biesecker has authored several peer-reviewed publications. Key works include "Optimization of Virotherapy for Cancer" in Bulletin of Mathematical Biology (2010, co-authors J.H. Kimn, H. Lu, D. Dingli, Ž. Bajzer); "Kinetic Monte Carlo Modeling on Organic Solar Cells: Domain Size, Donor-Acceptor Ratio and Thickness" in Nano Energy (2017, co-authors U. Neupane, B. Bahrami, M.F. Baroughi, Q. Qiao); "Monte Carlo Simulation of Förster Resonance Energy Transfer in 3D Nanoscale Organic Bulk Heterojunction Morphologies" in The Journal of Physical Chemistry C (2013, co-authors I. Maqsood et al.); "Modeling of Trap Assisted Interfacial Charge Transfer in Dye Sensitized Solar Cells" in Applied Physics Letters (2013, co-authors J. Nepal et al.); and "Kinetic Monte Carlo Modeling of Dark and Illuminated Current-Voltage Characteristics of Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells" in Applied Physics Letters (2013, co-authors P.M. Baidya et al.). He also published "The Inverse Problem of the Calculus of Variations for Systems of Second-Order Partial Differential Equations in the Plane" as an arXiv preprint in 2009. Additional contributions include posters on uncertainty of hydrologic events under South Dakota's changing conditions (2012) and a presentation on coupled systems of nonlinear reaction-diffusion equations at the SDSU Data Science Symposium (2018). Biesecker collaborates with researchers in electrical engineering and chemistry on solar cell projects, including NSF EPSCoR and USDA AFRI initiatives.

As a mentor, he served as first advisor for master's theses: "Numerical Simulation of the Acoustical Propagation of Thunder" by Jonathan S. Rood (2012) and "Rigid Equilibriums of a Rotating String" by Teddrick Schaffer (2019). He advised the 2025 Schultz-Werth Senior Paper Award winner in Data Science and Mathematics on "Leveraging Large Language Models for...".