Seminar in Computational and Applied Mathematics

The course meeting time for Spring 2013 is, tentatively, on Thursdays from 3 - 4:15 PM in BP-2. The coordinator for Spring 2013 is Scott MacLachlan; his office hours are Mondays and Wednesdays from 10:30 - noon in BP-212.

Grades
This course is graded as S(atisfactory)/U(nsatisfactory). To get a grade of Satisfactory, you need to attend almost all of the seminars and participate in the discussion. Students registered for credit are expected to lead the seminar occasionally. All are welcome to attend the seminars, even if they are not registered.

Academic Integrity
While there are no graded assignments in this course, students are required to abide by the university guidelines on academic integrity. For full details, see this link.

Disability Services
If you are requesting an accommodation due to a documented disability, you must register with the Disability Services Office at the beginning of the semester. To do so, call the Student Services Desk at 617-627-2000 to arrange an appointment with Linda Sullivan, Program Director of Disability Services.

Learning Objectives
This course addresses the following learning objectives of the Ph.D. Program in Mathematics

  • 1.b. Clear understanding of key hypotheses and conclusions
  • 1.c. Synthesis of formal theory into a comprehensive picture of mathematical phenomena
  • 1.d. Application of general theory to specific examples
  • 1.e. Sharpening of intuition through appropriate counterexamples
  • 3.a. Explanation of key ideas and general strategies
  • 3.b. Motivation of underlying issues
  • 3.c. Clear oral presentation of arguments
  • 3.d. Effective use of visual media
  • 3.f. Thinking on one's feet; fielding questions
  • 4.a. Searching the literature
  • 4.b. Reading and understanding definitions and statements of results
  • 4.c. Organizing information from disparate sources
  • 6.a. Classroom and blackboard techniques
  • 6.b. Organization and presentation of mathematics at a level appropriate to the audience
  • Schedule for Spring 2013

  • 1/17:Organizational Meeting
  • 1/24:Meghan on parametric level set methods for inverse problems
  • 1/31:CS Colloquium on Tensor Decompositions
  • 2/7: Reviewing papers: Review Template
  • 2/14:James on Gateaux and Frechet Derivatives
  • 2/21:SIAM CSE practice talks: Tom and Ning
  • 2/28:No meeting: SIAM CSE meeting
  • 3/7: SIAM CSE discussion
  • 3/14:Copper Mountain practice talks: Stephanie and Tom
  • 3/28:Stephanie on MPI
  • 4/4: Jay on Fast Adaptive Composite Grid Algorithms
  • 4/11:
  • 4/18:
  • 4/25:
  • Schedule for Fall 2012

    In Fall, 2012, the seminar was coordinated by James Adler.

  • 9/7: Matthias Bolten, University of Wuppertal, Multigrid methods for Toeplitz matrices and matrices from matrix algebras
  • 9/14: Informal discussion of Molecular Dynamics
  • 9/21: Informal discussion of deriving fluid laws through calculus of variations (James)
  • 9/28: Eric de Sturler, Virginia Tech,
  • 10/5: What Tom did last summer
  • 10/12: What Stephanie did last summer
  • 10/19: Discussion of Fourier analysis
  • 10/26: Eric Tytell, Tufts
  • 11/2: Jim Nagy, Emory,
  • 11/9: Tom Benson: Candidacy Exam
  • 11/16: Yu-Shan Lin, Tufts
  • 11/30: Melody Takeuchi
  • 12/7: Discussion of fast direct methods