1997 K-State Undergraduate Lecture Series in Mathematics
Lectures by four distinguished visiting mathematicians, three alumni, and a government representative were the highlights of our Undergraduate Lecture Series at Kansas State University in 1997.Hans Sagan, a distinguished mathematician from North Carolina State University, visited Kansas State in the spring and gave a mini-course on Space Filling Curves. Dr. Sagan presented many interesting examples of continuous maps of the interval onto the square and higher dimensional cubes as well. In the fall, Roger Cooke, an eminent mathematician from the University of Vermont, visited Kansas State and gave a mini-course on Mathematical World Lines. Professor Cooke traced the development of number theory, geometry, algebra, calculus, and logic from the earliest times to the twentieth century. Stan Gudder, a noted mathematician from the University of Denver, also visited Kansas State in the fall and gave a mini-course on Problems in Probability in which he discussed various basic problems in probability theory. These three mini-courses were very well received, attracting visitors from Lawrence, Topeka, and Wichita.
Kenneth Ribet, a world famous mathematician from the University of California at Berkeley, gave an outstanding undergraduate lecture on The Shimura-Tanniyama Conjecture in which he described how Fermat's Last Theorem depends on a conjecture about cubic equations with integer coefficients.
Keith Loseke, a 1995 Kansas State mathematics alumnus, gave a talk entitled Mathematical Applications in Secure Satellite Communication in which he described his work on the Milstar nulling antenna for TRW in Los Angeles. Yaping Liu, a 1993 Kansas State mathematics alumnus, gave a presentation entitled Mathematricks. Yaping is now teaching mathematics at Pittsburg State University. Michael Anderson, a 1969 Kansas State mathematics alumnus, gave a talk entitled Operations Research: A Career Field to Consider in which he applied linear programming techniques to production optimization problems. Dr. Anderson is an operations research analyst for the United States Army Training and Doctrine Command Analysis Center at Fort Leavenworth.
Allen Davis, Director of Resource Management at the TRADOC Analysis Center, described Summer Intern Opportunities available at Fort Leavenworth.