Zoekresultaten
The art of doing maths
28-03-2023
… Zoekresultaten “Look at the person to your left and right: of the three of you, only one will graduate”, the lecturer said when Ralf Peeters attended his first lecture in Applied Mathematics in Delft. Thirty-six years later, Peeters is professor of Mathematics at Maastricht University. Without him, the Department of Data Science and Knowledge Engineering, which offers one of UM’s most successful study programmes, would have been swallowed up by another faculty long ago. Not that he’d ever say as much himself. Read on for portrait of a bridge builder, a puzzler, an art lover and, above all, a scientist. Ralf Peeters (1964) is professor of Mathematics of Knowledge Engineering and vice chair of the Department of Data Science and Knowledge Engineering. Since 1994 he has worked at Maastricht University, where he has collaborated successfully on various interdisciplinary projects. “Proper” …
Through Ariadne’s guidance
28-03-2023
… "We want to know: is it possible that the system does a particular thing in the future?" Zoekresultaten The modern-day incarnation of an ancient Greek goddess is a software package that provides rigorous, mathematical certainty about problems involving change. Applying Ariadne Indeed, the Minotaur using Theseus’ string to escape the maze seems like an outcome the Greek Ariadne would have wanted to rule out. There is no shortage of modern problems for … signs.” However, the software applies to many types of situations. “ARIADNE provides a very general framework for rigorous analysis of all kinds of problems, and we are constantly working on enlarging the kind of systems we can look at.” Ariadne’s mathematics The software’s strength lies in how it embeds confidence in its answers. “The mathematics behind ARIADNE is calculus, the kind that you might study in the first year of university. If you go a bit further in applied mathematics, people get computers to solve these problems. Doing that the usual way introduces tiny errors that blow …
A unique Dutch windmill
28-03-2023
… “I find mathematics extremely challenging and intensely creative.” Zoekresultaten As it turns out, Dutch windmills are not just national icons. They also hold a unique position in the mathematical landscape. Partial ID Although eigenvalues don’t hold all the keys, they do contain important structural information about the graph they represent. For example, the number of eigenvalues corresponds to the number of nodes. Eigenvalues can … five nodes, they are clearly different. The center node of the left graph has no connections, while the center node of the right graph is connected to every other node. However, their eigenvalues - the row of numbers on the bottom - are the same. Mathematical landmarks So far so good – back to the windmill. Abiad: “Dutch windmills have their own graph. It’s obvious to see why the graph has that name. But this graph is actually quite special, since it is completely recognizable* from its …
The math games surrounding us
28-03-2023
… “Writing down a game can be done with very simple mathematical tools. But solving it? That can be incredibly complex.” Zoekresultaten The cheerful statues of the Zaat Herremenieke are connected to hundreds of mathematicians worldwide, who work in a field called game theory. Biological applications “Over the course of my career, I became more and more captivated by biological applications. A bee doesn’t know how much nectar is in a flower, for example, or how … were to make it more realistic, you need information you don’t have or include equations which cannot be solved.” The interplay between simplicity and complexity is also what Thuijsman enjoys most. “Writing down a game can be done with very simple mathematical tools. But solving it?” His eyes light up again. “That can be incredibly complex.” “Simple” games This matrix – the numbers in the box – shows a deceptively simple game. It’s a game between two players, the row player and the column player . …