My name is Josué Tonelli-Cueto. However, this is a small lie. My actual name is Josué Tonelli Cueto. In Spain, it is customary to have two surnames, one being the first one of the father and the other one the first one of the mother. However, to avoid confusion in international contexts, I write my surname with a dash. In this way, it is clear that both words form part of my surname and that none of them is a middle name.

I am originally from Bilbao, a city of the Basque Country in the north of Spain, although I was born in Santander, another city in the north of Spain. I consider myself from Bilbao because that's the city I grew up in and I was brought up in. Also, as they say in Spanish, “the cow is from where it grazes” and “people from Bilbao are born wherever they want.”

Currently, I am a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor at the Department of Quantitative Methods of CUNEF Universidad. My interests are numerical algorithms and condition-based complexity, computational algebraic geometry, and random geometry.

Apart from discussing, thinking and writing about mathematics, I also enjoy other aspects of life. Here is a quasi-random alphabetical list of another ten things I enjoy: 1st, chatting and discussing random topics with friends (and sometimes other people) over a beer (or other equivalent drink); 2nd, drinking coffee; 3rd, folding origami figures; 4th, Iberian ham; 5th, reading non-mathematical books; 6th, riding a bike; 7th, sending postcards; 8th, swimming in the sea (when possible); 9th, walking while lost in my thoughts; and 10th, writing short stories, poems and calligrams. Of course, there are more things I enjoy, like cats, but listing things I enjoy is not something I enjoy.

Academic biography

I studied the Licenciatura en Matemáticas, which is a five-year bachelor in mathematics, at the University of the Basque Country between 2009 and 2014. During my studies, I founded and edited, together with Ricardo Grande and the help of Marta Macho-Stadler, the magazine $\pi kasle$. This magazine was a magazine about popular mathematics written by students. Also, I participated in the debating club of the university.

Additionally, during my studies, I was lucky enough to be given further opportunities to pursue further my mathematical interests. In 2011 and 2012, I attended the Undergraduate Summer Program of the Park City Mathematics Institute, thanks to grants provided to me by the program. In 2013, I could enjoy a summer undergraduate research experience at the ICMAT in Madrid under the supervision of Andrei Jaikin-Zapirain, thanks to a scholarship of the Spanish Government. And, in 2014, I enjoyed another undergraduate research experience at the University of the Basque Country under the supervision of Gustavo Adolfo Fernández Alcober, thanks to a scholarship of the Basque Government.

In 2014, I joined the Berlin Mathematical School, a joint graduate program in mathematics of the three Berlin universities, as a Phase I student (i.e., a master student) thanks to a scholarship of ”la Caixa” Foundation and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). In 2016, after completing the Qualifying Exam of the BMS, I became a Phase II student. In 2017, I concluded the Master in Mathematics at the Technische Universität Berlin, after writing my master's thesis under the supervision of Peter Bürgisser. That same year, I became a PhD student of Peter Bürgisser and Felipe Cucker at the Technische Universität Berlin, thanks to a doctoral fellowship funded by the Einstein Foundation Berlin. In 2019, I successfully defended my PhD thesis on the 28th of November and became a doctor.

During my stay at BMS, I have participated actively in the life of the school. During 2017, I was a BMS Student Representative; in 2018, I organized the BMS Student Conference, together with my fellow student representatives; and, since 2016 until the end of my studies, I was participating in the organization of the “What is...?” Seminar.

In Februry of 2020, I joined as a postdoc the OURAGAN team at INRIA Paris and the IMJ-PRG under the mentorship of Fabrice Rouillier and Elias Tsigaridas, being under a postdotoral fellowship ("Interaction" program of 2020) of the Fondation Sciences Mathématiques de Paris from October of 2020.

In October of 2022, I moved to the USA. There, I was as a Lecturer/Postdoc the Department of Mathematics of University of Texas at San Antonio under the mentorship of Alperen A. Ergür during the academic year 2022/23. In 2023, I became a Rufus Isaacs Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics of Johns Hopkins University, under the supervision of Soledad Villar. I held this position until January of 2026, when I moved to Spain. During my postdoc at Hopkins, I was an active member of the postdoc community. I participated actively in the postdoc union, Hopkins PRO-UAW, becoming a member of the Bargaining Committee, and the Homewood Postdoctoral Association, HW-PDA, of which I was co-president in the academic year 2024/25.

Finally, I had the pleasure of being the Chairperson of the Organizing Committee of the RSME's Congres of Young Researchers, that took place in Bilbao from the 13th to the 17th of Janaury of 2025. This congress was organized with a wonderful team of young Basque mathematicians, which made the congress possible. This congress had 487 participants, 38 parallel sessions and 366 parallel talks, being, when it was organized, the biggest Spanish national conference of mathematics organized until then.

Math Genealogy

You can research my mathematical academic ancestors and relatives through the Math Genealogy Project.

Math Genealogy Project ID: 256775 Poster of my Academic Genealogy