Special Relativity

June 30, 2017Leave a comment

By Katie Clark, Tori Dunston, Kelly Fan, Abrianna Macklin, and McKenna Vernon

Picture a hummingbird. At any moment, it can go in any of the three dimensions it is a part of. So, it could go up and down, forwards and backwards, or left and right. But, one thing that is not taken into account is time. As it moves through space, it is also occupying time. However, we’re not used to thinking about our world in a four dimensional sense. But, as the movement of the pigeon progresses, so does time. This is known as the relationship between space and time, and it is the primary foundation that special relativity is built on. So, at any given moment, it actually can move in four dimensions at once. This can be simply modeled using a spacetime diagram.

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Mathematical Epidemiology

July 12, 2019September 2, 2019Leave a comment

by Jillian Byrnes, La’Ziyah Henry, Delphine Liu, Sophie Ussery, and Elizabeth Whetzel.

What is Mathematical Epidemiology?

What is mathematical epidemiology? Well, mathematical epidemiology is when mathematicians use math to predict outcomes in various statistical problems. These problems include growth in infectious bacteria, change in population, and even the effects of climate change. Why is this used? It is used because it doesn’t need a complete set of data to figure out a solution, as long as you can create an equation and plug in the values.

Who uses it? Mathematicians and scientists use it in fields such as biotechnology, medical science, civil engineering, and as public health professionals.

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Schoolhouse Rock—Dr. Candice Price Rocks!

July 2, 2021July 7, 2021Leave a comment

By Clara, Ceren, Zoe, and Jess

Dr. Candice Price had always been good at math. But when her third-grade teacher presented “Schoolhouse Rock!–Multiplication Rock!” to her class, her passion truly began. The 30-minute multiplication lesson inspired her everlasting enthusiasm for mathematics. It is this inspiration that drove her to be the accomplished female mathematician that she is today.

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Quantum Mechanics

July 2, 2018August 6, 2018Leave a comment

By Izzy Cox, Divya Iyer, Wgoud Mansour, Ashleigh Sico, and Elizabeth Whetzel.

Quantum Mechanics is the physics of molecular and microscopic particles. However, it has applications in everyday life as well. If someone asked you if a human was a particle or a wave, what would you think? What about a ball? What about light? Not so easy now, is it? It turns out that all of those things, and in fact, everything around us, can be expressed in physics as both a particle and a wave. This might seem a little unbelievable, but for now, let’s start with the basics.

Classical Physics

Although Classical Physics sounds like a complicated idea, it’s the most simple branch of physics. It’s what you think of when someone says “physics”. Classical Physics lays the basic foundation to Quantum Physics with a few basic laws.

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Dr. Amanda Ruiz: Blazing Trails with Math

July 2, 2021July 7, 2021Leave a comment

By Aynsley, Carrington, Susan, Tehya, and others

In recent years, more and more women are using math to tackle serious social issues such as gender inequality and lack of diversity in STEM careers. These trailblazers pave the way for the newest generation of women and minorities in STEM, inspiring them to become active for what they believe in. One such example is seen within the field of mathematics: Dr. Amanda Ruiz of the University of San Diego.

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Elliptic Curve Cryptography

June 30, 2017July 3, 2017Leave a comment

By Noa Bearman, Kimberly Cruz Lopez, Tina Lin, Xintong Xiang, and Maria Neri Otero*

*Maria helped the group work through the problem set but was unfortunately unable to attend camp during the blog writing.

Introduction

Have you ever tried to send a secret message to a friend? Did it work? Was it secure? Well, one way to do so in a more secure way is by using Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC). Most people have never heard of ECC before, and two weeks ago, neither did we. However, in the past two weeks, we have been learning how to use this exciting application of the techniques of algebraic geometry and abstract algebra applied to the ancient art of keeping messages secure. ECC was first introduced by Victor Miller and Neal Koblitz in 1985. It was proposed as an alternative to other forms of cryptography with public-key systems such as DSA and RSA. Public-key systems involve the use of two different kinds of keys: a public key that is available to the public and a private key in which only the owner knows. The applications of ECC has been growing and has recently gained a lot of attention in industry and academia. The following information below will go more in-depth on what ECC is, how it works, its advantages, its disadvantages, and our progression throughout this course.

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Network Science @ WPI

July 7, 2022July 29, 2022Leave a comment

By Maddie, Nitya, Amel, Alyssa

Introduction

We were part of this year’s Girls Talk Math program. This was a great opportunity that we came across in different ways. It has helped us learn about different math topics that we may not have had the opportunity to discover on our own. This topic may seem boring at first, but they all have their individual charms. The topic we chose was Network Science, and together we got to learn about things such as coding on Python.

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The Art of Cryptography

June 10, 2016July 31, 2016Leave a comment

By: Nia Beverly, Makayla McDaniel, Yuanyuan Matherly, and Tyler Deegan

Introduction

Cryptography is defined as the art of writing and solving codes. Upon first thought, many people picture codes as an antiquated war time communication technique. However, the field of cryptography is alive and well, and it has become pervasive in our everyday lives. The world is becoming more and more connected through technology, and with this, there is a greater need to protect information. Encryption is probably the most widely used application of cryptography, and it is used to protect information by making it so only one person with a key can understand what is transmitted. In the following paragraphs we will walk through the steps to mathematically understanding one widely used type of encryption.

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Mathematical Epidemiology

July 2, 2018August 6, 2018Leave a comment

By Camilla Fratta, Ananya Jain, Sydney Mason, Gabby Matejowsky, and Nevaeh Pinkney*.

*Nevaeh helped the group work through the problem set but was unfortunately unable to attend camp during the blog writing.

Mathematical Epidemiology explores the realm of mathematics applied to public health. It relies on modeling to use known information about certain scenarios regarding the spread of diseases and then uses it to predict future outcomes. By the end of the problem set, our group learned about the challenging process that comes with trying to predict population sizes in order to control the spreading of diseases. The equations that are faced in this branch of mathematics are at the heart of mathematical modeling.

Mathematical Models and Modeling

A mathematical model is an equation used to predict or model the most likely results to occur in a real-world situation. We used these types of equations to model the spread of a disease in a population, tracking the flow of populations from susceptible to infected to recovered. In real life scenarios, there are too many variables to fully account for, so we only were able to place a few in our equations. This made the models less accurate, but at the same time very useful to us in our problem set. They gave us a good idea of how things worked in an actual epidemic and helped us to understand what mathematical modeling really is.

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Scientific Computing: Recurrence Relations

June 23, 2016July 25, 2016Leave a comment

By: Kathryn Benedict, Kate Allen, Sarai Ross, Rosy Nuam

Girls Talk Math is an all girls camp that introduces new topics that students would not normally see in their everyday math class at school. This camp also brings together many young women to better explore a field that is male dominated. During this camp we were able to research many important women that we able to make their own legacy while facing much adversity along the way. The camp wants to show not only the campers but also other women going into the field of math and science to not be afraid due to the gender difference, but instead use it as motivation to carry on doing what you love and making your own legacy along the way.

Our group consisted of four young women. Kathryn is a rising sophomore at Cedar Ridge High School. Kate is a rising sophomore at Carrboro High School. Sarai is a rising junior at Northern Vance High School. Rosy is a rising senior at East Chapel Hill High School.

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