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News & Events

Pi Club Events

  • Lunchtime lecture: Prof. G. Petruska, IPFW Computer Science, on Series and Products: Euler's Wizardry. Monday, Nov. 16, noon in KT 216.
    • The main topic of this talk will be Euler's famous summation formula (also known as the Euler-Maculaurin formula). Following Euler's path, we will deduce several interesting results, some of which go back centuries into the history of mathematics. Understanding the mathematical thinking and machinery of Euler's era, we will endeavor to apply these results to "obtain" more modern results, such as the famous Mertens' theorem.
  • Chili Supper: Oct. 23, followed by IPFW women's volleyball game at 7:00.
  • Lunchtime guest speaker: Bill Erdman, on Actuarial Careers, Oct. 19.
  • Math club book sale, 9:30-6:30 in KT ground floor, October 7 and 8, 2009.
  • Beginning of Fall 2009 Semester/Welcome Back Picnic: Sept. 14, 2009.
  • End-of-Semester party, May 8, 2009.
  • Student Research Talks: April 8.
    • Garret Marshall, The confessions of tortured data
    • Richard Grzych, Relax, problem solved
    • Ryan Fritz and Chris Baber, How financial indicators compare with an economic indicator
  • Prof. L. Beineke, IPFW, Through the Lurking Graphs, Thursday, March 19, 2009.
    • Behind many a game and puzzle there lies some graph theory. In this presentation, we will give some of the ABCs of the subject, such as Asteroid, Bridg-it, Curious Coins, and Dots-and-Boxes (and more). The talk will be accessible to students without a background in graph theory.
  • Chili Supper: Monday evening, March 2, 6:00 in Gates 120. IPFW women's basketball game at 7:00.
  • Prof. P. Dragnev, School Districts on Mars, Fuel Depots on Jupiter, Inimical Dictators on Neptune?! Or How to Arrange Points on the Sphere, Monday, March 2, 2009.
    • Isn’t it interesting what connects the objects in the title? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all Schools were so perfectly located on Mars that no students in any School District had to walk “too much”? Or the Fuel Depots were so conveniently located that it was easy to ship fuel to all parts of Jupiter? And what about all these Dictators on Neptune, that hate each other so much, that we want them as far apart as possible?

      Now seriously, the “uniform” distribution of many points on the unit sphere is a highly non-trivial problem with applications throughout the whole spectrum of modern science. Whether one studies electrons in equilibrium from Physics, large fullerene compounds from Chemistry, orifices of pollen grain from Biology, or data encoding from Computer Science, one arrives at spherical arrangements of points that minimize some form of energy. So, tighten your seatbelts and prepare for a fascinating journey around the Galaxy of Minimal Energy Points.

  • Student talk by Drew Swartz, An Investigation of the Structure Underlying Irreducible Divisors, Monday, Feb. 16, 2009.
    • Interested in learning about a current area of mathematical research? This talk will discuss some of the work being done by undergraduates, like yourselves, at an undergraduate research program at Wabash College, funded by the National Science Foundation. Don't be deterred if you have not yet had a course in Abstract Algebra. Plenty of time will be allocated towards giving a general introduction to the topics at hand.
      A current trend in algebraic research is to utilize graph theory as a tool to analyze the algebraic properties of special sets of numbers, called "rings." In this talk we'll examine how the relatively new concept of the "irreducible divisor graph" allows us to better understand factoring within rings.
  • Pi Math Club Pictures, 2008-09

 

 

 

 

 

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