Mathematics Department Research Seminar / FALL 2009
Fri. 3:30 - 4:30 pm
47 Cowley Hall

	9/11	Futaba Okamoto A Math Problem with Checkerboards and Coins
	9/18	Futaba Okamoto A Checkerboard Problem and Modular Colorings of Graphs
	9/25	Robert Allen Classical and Modern Operator Theory on the Bloch Space
	10/2	Robert Allen Analysis on Discrete Structures: The Beginnings of Discrete Operator Theory?
	10/9	Futaba Okamoto Reflections on Colorings
	10/16	David Taylor (Roanoke College) Gems of Mathematics: Lie Algebras, Harmonic Series, and No Connection Between Them This talk will explore a few of the important topics from Lie algebras and representation theory necessary to look at the so-called correlation functions on infinite-dimensional Lie algebras studied by Bloch and Okounkov (recent 2007 Fields Medal winner) and my extensions of these ideas to other infinite dimensional Lie algebras (and why one would want to). In addition, I will talk about my more recent work in (computational) number theory in finding a continuous family of series between the harmonic series and the alternating harmonic series. This work yields some very interesting and amazing results, along with more questions to be answered in the future. Two talks for the price of one (and in the time commitment of one)!
	10/23	Mark Campanelli (Southwest Minnesota State University) Multicellular Mathematical Models of Somitogenesis
	10/30	Mathematica Demo
	11/6	Sherwin Toribio Detection of Outlying Discrimination Parameters in a Hierarchical IRT Model Item Response Theory (IRT) models are commonly used in educational and psychological testing to assess the (latent) abilities of examinees and the effectiveness of the test items in measuring this underlying trait. Two commonly used IRT models for dichotomous response are the One-parameter and Two-parameter IRT models. When items are expected to have similar discrimination values, the hierarchical IRT model might be preferred over the Two-parameter model because it has fewer parameters to estimate. However, it is important to verify that there are no items with outlying discrimination parameters. In this talk, two different Bayesian procedures to check for outlying discrimination parameters will be presented. The first one makes use of the Bayes factor, while the second one utilizes a mixture prior density. The effectiveness of these methods will be illustrated using simulated data.
	11/13	James Peirce Epidemiological Models with Multiple Hosts
	11/20	Ted Wendt Collisions of Elastic Bodies Using a Complementarity Model
	12/4	Huiya Yan Study of Network Detection for Some Graphs
	12/11	Raymond Leach Has Membership in GATT/WTO Enhanced Trade? Determining the Effects of GATT/WTO Membership on International Trade Vince Zander The 'Secret-Santa' Problem Generating Matchings That Obey Constraints
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