MenuEvents for 10/12/2017 from all calendars
Brown Bag Lunch Series
Time: 12:00PM - 1:00PM
Location: BLOC 220
Description: For faculty can exchange ideas and strategies on teaching
Brown Bag Lunch Series on Teaching
Time: 12:00PM - 1:00PM
Location: Blocker 220
Speaker: Ben Aurispa, Texas A&M
Title: Using Additional WebAssign Features to Aid Instruction
Abstract: Many instructors view WebAssign as just a homework platform. While this is the primary purpose, there are features within WebAssign that can aid in instruction by helping instructors to see what problems students struggle with and can help identify students who may be at risk. Instructors can also see how much time students spend in WebAssign and exactly when they are doing their homework. I will discuss these features as well as some of their limitations.
Doctoral defense of Bingbing Ji
Time: 3:00PM - 4:00PM
Location: BLOC 612
Speaker: Bingbing Ji
Description: Title: A Local Minimax Method Using the Generalized Nehari Manifold for Finding Differential Saddles Abstract: A new local minimax method (LMM) for finding the first few unconstrained saddles of a functional is developed, so that different types of saddle point problems in infinite-dimensional spaces can be solved. This method is based on a dynamics of points on virtual geometric objects such as curves, surfaces, etc. and it covers several existing algorithms in the literature as its algorithm framework is general. Algorithm stability and convergence are mathematically verified. The new algorithm is tested on several benchmark problems commonly used in the literature to show its stability and efficiency, then it is applied to numerically compute saddles of a semilinear elliptic PDE for both (focusing) M-type and (defocusing) W-type cases. It is shown that those virtual geometric objects can be easily defined without knowing their explicit expressions and extended to find k-saddles so there is a great flexibility to choose preferred geometric objects for some purposes, such as convergence acceleration. Inspired by this feature, since all the non-trivial critical points stay on the Nehari manifold, it is used to accelerate the convergence and a comparison of computation speed between using the Nehari manifold and quadratic geometric objects on the same semilinear elliptic PDEs is given, then a mixed M and W type case is solved by LMM with the Nehari manifold. To solve the indefinite M-type problems, the generalized Nehari manifold is introduced in detail and a more general dynamic system of points on it is given. The corresponding local minimax method is justified by establishing a strong energy dissipation law and showing the convergence of the algorithm. The new algorithm with the generalized Nehari manifold is then applied to solve some indefinite M-type cases. A numerical investigation of bifurcation for indefinite problems will be given in order to provide numerical evidence for PDE analysts for future stud
Promotion Talk - Ben Lynch
Time: 3:00PM - 4:00PM
Location: BLOC 220
Speaker: Benjamin Lynch, Texas A&M University
Description:
Title: How research in Partially-supplied graphs informs my teaching style
Abstract:
In this talk, I will discuss some of my research along with my philosophy of teaching. For the research, we will discuss the relationship between graphs and their corresponding matrices. Specifically, we will focus on the case where the matrix only contains partial information from the graph, but the eigenvectors still provide information about the full graph. This case has particular relevance to some biological applications. Also, I will discuss how my research informs my teaching in the classroom, and provide several examples of how I teach concepts to my students.
Bingbing Ji, dissertation defense
Time: 3:00PM - 4:30PM
Location: Blocker 612
Speaker: Bingbing Ji
