Theo McKenzie

Theo McKenzie joins the FAS as Assistant Professor of Statistics and Data Science. He proves rigorous mathematical results about the structure of random networks. A principal strategy he has advanced is to interpret these networks as physical systems, identify signatures of quantum chaos in their spectral behavior, and use those features to establish strong graph-expansion properties with applications in computer science.  

In his recent work, McKenzie and two collaborators showed that a constant fraction of random graphs satisfying a regularity condition are optimal spectral expanders. McKenzie obtained his PhD in mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley.  

Mckenzie has subsequently served as an NSF MPS-Ascend Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Mathematics at Harvard University and as a Science Fellow in the Department of Mathematics at Stanford University.