EMERGENCY INFOPi Mu Epsilon
PME Activities Fall 2008
By the end of this fall semester, Marshall University's chapter of Pi Mu Epsilon felt accomplished and ready for the upcoming semesters. Like previous ones, the members of the club with their advisor, Shannon Miller, and fellow instructor, Rob-Roy Mace, attended the Ohio Section MAA conference. This fall's October meeting was held at Capitol University in Columbus, Ohio. Two of the student attendants gave 20 minute talks. Tom Cutcha, currently an undergraduate in the mathematics department, gave a presentation about his independent summer research in abstract algebra, specifically zero divisors, which has recently been published. Michael Otunuga, a graduate student, gave a speech about his research on the Reimann Hypothesis. You can see all the students that traveled to the conference seated for the student talks of the day. From left to right in the picture below, they are Brittany Balcom, Charlie Lowe, Danielle Clark, and Clyde Meador.
In the next picture Michael Otunuga, Deepak Basyal, Tom Cuchta and Sydney Mkhatshwa are shown.
Three of these members, Tom Cuchta, Michael Otunuga, Clyde Meador each participated in the Marshall University Mathematics Department Student Seminar Fall 2008 as well. Each student gave presentations on their current research and are featured in the Student Semiar article. The PME group was able to recruit 11 new members for the Fall 2008 semester. This is a record for the current advisor.
The new members are, from left to right, (first row) Amy Sietz, Lisa Mathis, (second row) Grace Amyusan, Sam Skelley, Brittany Whited, Maggie Chenowith, Sydney Mkhatshwa, and Alex King. Mike Smith, Deepak Basyal, and Carla Ramirez are not pictured. At a couple of meetings, the students discussed designing T-shirts as a fundraising idea. They also developed a "FUN-raising" pumpkin drop competition in conjunction with the Physics Department. The task will be to create a vehicle in which to drop a pumpkin from the rooftop and protect the pumpkin from busting. Look for T-shirt sales this spring and the pumpkin drop next fall. The group also has goals of table tennis tournaments and other game parties soon to be announced. Pi Mu Epsilon welcomes all to our meetings for fun, food, and math! Check us out in the spring! Please contact Shannon Miller(miller207@marshall.edu) for more information.
Student Seminar Fall 2008
The Marshall University Department of Mathematics in conjunction with the National Mathematics Honorary Fraternity, Pi Mu Epsilon, held student seminars this fall allowing students to give presentations to the mathematics department, fellow students, and the general public. Everyone meets for refreshments and mathematics about once a month, and this fall there were three presenters. Tom Cutcha, currently an undergraduate in the mathematics department, presented in September. He gave a presentation about his independent summer research on the subject of Group and Ring Theory in Abstract Algebra and the maps for such rings. This research has recently been published. In the photo below
you can see Tom explaining his maps with multi-color chalk. Michael Otunuga, a graduate student, presented his research in October. His talk was discussing his spare time work on the Reimann Hypothesis and Fermat's Last Theorem. You can see him in this photo
pointing to his Powerpoint presentation. Michael has also created computer programs which he incorporates into his research presentations to compute large formulaic calculations quickly. Cylde Meador, an undergraduate, gave his presentation in November on his current thesis topic involving numerical differential equations. Clyde has also created an extraordinary computer programs that, in the image below
plots chaotic attractors for his systems. Here is Clyde's presentation flier. Similarly look for others in the coming semesters. If you would like to be a presenter, or know someone else that would, please contact Shannon Miller(miller207@marshall.edu) for further information.