Dr Jack Keeler

• BSc (Hons) Mathematics, University of Nottingham, 2005
• PGCE Secondary Mathematics, University of East Anglia, 2007
• MA Research Methods in Mathematics Education, University of East Anglia, 2008
• PhD Applied Mathematics, University of Adelaide/University of East Anglia, 2018

Jack completed his BSc in Mathematics at the University of Nottingham in 2005. After a few years teaching English abroad in Japan and Spain, he completed a PGCE in Secondary Mathematics and an MA in Mathematics Education and then proceeded to work in the UK state school system from 2007 to 2014, spending the last 3 years as Head of Mathematics at the newly-established Lowestoft Sixth Form College in Suffolk.

He then remembered he quite liked doing mathematics (as well as teaching) and so completed a PhD from 2014-2018 in Applied Mathematics as a co-tutelle between the University of East Anglia and the University of Adelaide, with supervisors Mark Blyth and Ben Binder. His first post-doc position was in the University of Manchester working with Andrew Hazel, Anne Juel and Alice Thompson from 2018-2020. His second post-doc was in the University of Warwick working with James Sprittles and Duncan Lockerby from 2020-2022. He then became a Leverhulme Early Career fellow at the University of East Anglia on the project “Wave-free ship design: Can a moving body leave no wake” (ECF-2021-17). This lasted until 2025 and in November 2025 he became an Assistant Professor at Birmingham University.

Second Semester 2

• LH/LI Differential Equations and Dynamical systems (Part B)

Jack is accepting PhD students interested in nonlinear dynamics, fluid dynamics and asymptotic analysis.

Dr Keeler is broadly interested in complex nonlinear systems in fluid dynamics by applying analytic and numerical techniques to understand fundamental interfacial phenomena. Jack has worked on a number of diverse physical problems, including:

• Eliminating the nonlinear Kelvin-wake produced by a boat 
• Finding time-periodic orbits of the nonlinear forced water-wave problem
• Understanding air bubble propagation in a Hele-Shaw channel
• Analysing the stability of the moving contact-line between two viscous fluids and a solid
• Finding exact solutions for wave-vortex interactions in a linear shear flow
• Developing formal asymptotic techniques to describe nonlinear oscillations

He has expertise in the asymptotic analysis of differential equations, applied dynamical systems theory, nonlinear waves, numerical analysis using the finite-element method (oomph-lib) and complex-variables analysis. Jack's main research goals are to develop synergies between mathematical theory and numerical computation that are portable to a broad range of complex continuum systems with free-boundaries.