The Math Department is starting a new tradition this fall with the inauguration of the University of Miami Mathematics Union (UMMU). This is a club for undergrads, grad students, and even faculty, to promote the enjoyment of mathematics. We hope to give students the chance to get to know each other, and to get to know some faculty.

Each meeting will be centered around a seminar talk of broad mathematical interest. Prerequisites will be kept to a minimum, meaning that everyone who enjoys mathematics (or thinks they might) is welcome. Pizza will also be served.

For further information contact Dr. Drew Armstrong or Dr. Ken Baker.

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An informal gathering to promote the enjoyment of mathematics.

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Dr. Ken Baker will talk about...

Curves on a Klein Bottle

Thursday, October 22, 2009, 5:00pm
Ungar Room 402

Pizza will be served.
This talk is intended for anyone with an interest in mathematics.
Please join us!

How many different curves are on a sphere?
on a torus? on a Mobius band? on a Klein bottle?
Three. No, that can't be right. Or can it?
What do you mean by different anyways?
And for that matter, what are you calling a curve?

We'll examine the "small" surfaces from the topological perspective
and try to get a handle on the number of simple closed curves on them.

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Dr. Drew Armstrong will talk about...

What is Information?

Thursday, September 17, 2009, 5:00pm
Ungar Room 402

Pizza will be served.
This talk is intended for anyone with an interest in mathematics.
Please join us!

I just flipped a coin. How much would you pay me to know the outcome? One dollar? How much would you pay me to know the outcome of seven coin flips? $2.81? These are not just academic questions. Being able to give a precise value to information is vital in our age of communication.

Evry Englsh msg cntns sm rdndncy, doesn't it? If I give you a text file written in English, by how much could you compress it? In 1948 a Bell Labs researcher named Claude Shannon gave beautiful and precise answers to these questions. It turns out you can *easily* compress an English text file by a factor of 2. If you're infinitely smart, you might approach a factor of 8!