Events
The Department of Mathematics sponsors a regular colloquium that hosts several talks by
external speakers every year and a general faculty seminar for talks by faculty and
students. Seminars are listed below the colloquia.
Mathematics Colloquium
The next Mathematics Colloquium will take place on Tuesday, October 21, at 3 pm, in
(live viewing in YR 320). , Stellenbosch University, South Africa, will give a virtual talk on Large zeros of linear recurrence sequences.
Abstract. The Skolem Problem asks to determine whether a given integer linear recurrence sequence
(LRS) has a zero term. This problem, whose decidability has been open for many decades,
arises across a wide range of topics in computer science, including loop termination,
formal languages, automata theory, and probabilistic model checking, amongst many
others.
In joint work with J. Ouaknine and J. Worrell, we introduce a notion of "large" zeros
of LRSs, i.e., zeros occurring at an index larger than a sixth-fold exponential of
the size of the data defining the given LRS. We establish two main results. First,
we show that large zeros are very sparse: the set of positive integers that can possibly
arise as large zeros of some LRS has null density. This in turn immediately yields
a Universal Skolem Set of density one, answering a question left open in the literature.
Second, we define an infinite set of prime numbers, termed "good", having density
one amongst all prime numbers, with the following property: for any large zero of
a given LRS, there is an interval around the large zero together with an upper bound
on the number of good primes possibly present in that interval. The bound in question
is much lower than one would expect if good primes were distributed similarly as ordinary
prime numbers, as per the Cramer model in number theory. We therefore conjecture that
large zeros do not exist, which would entail decidability of the Skolem Problem.
This research is supported by the 2024 ERC Synergy Project DynAMiCs.
Future Talks
On Monday, October 27, at 3:30 pm, , Professor Emeritus of Statistics at UMBC, will present An Introduction to Statistical Meta-Analysis with an Application.
Recent Mathematics Colloquium Talks
| Date | Topic | Speaker |
|---|---|---|
| Apr 25, 2025 | Defining connected components |
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| Apr 24, 2025 | Middle-school students’ meanings of points from quantitative and covariational reasoning perspectives |
, |
| Mar 14, 2025 | A multi-species, multi-stimuli rheological model for living polymers |
, |
| Feb 13, 2025 | Using data science to understand patterns of social harm |
, |
| Apr 24, 2024 | Arboreal Galois groups: Introduction |
, |
| Apr 17, 2024 | Thicket density |
Dr. Siddharth Bhaskar, |
| Apr 3, 2024 | Finite element exterior calculus in four-dimensional space |
, |
| Apr 3, 2024 | Finite-dimensional reduction of dissipative PDEs |
, |
| Mar 29, 2024 | Patterns, algorithms, and your friends |
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| Mar 8, 2024 | Finite expression method: A symbolic approach for scientific machine learning |
, |
| Feb 14, 2024 | Biostatistics: Applications of statistics in biomedicine and public health |
, |
Seminar Meetings
The Mathematics Seminar is the venue where Towson faculty and students report on their research activities.
The first meeting of the Mathematics Seminar for the 2025-26 year will take place on Wednesday, October 22, at 4 pm, when Dr. Miriam Parnes will present the inaugural talk.
In addition several research groups have research seminars in their respective research areas:
- ASRM Seminar (coordinated by Min Ji):
Meets on Fridays at 10 am - Number Theory Seminar (coordinated by A. Kumchev and N. McNew):
Meets on Tuesdays at 4:30 pm in YR 320.
Recent and Upcoming Seminars
- October 16, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
, McDaniel College, will give at talk on Sums of k-th powers in ramified p-adic rings.
Abstract. Generalizations of Waring's Problem—that for every natural number \(k\) there exists an integer \(g(k)\) such that every natural number can be written as the sum of at most \(g(k)\) \(k\)-th powers—have been studied in a variety of contexts from algebraic number fields to non-commutative groups. We examine the calculation of Waring numbers \(g_R(k)\) for rings of integers \(R\) in completely ramified \(p\)-adic extensions. For specific \(k\) and a specific ring of integers \(R\) of a \(p\)-adic extension, Hensel's Lemma can reduce determination of the Waring Number \(g_R(k)\) to a finite (but possibly very large) number of concrete cases. We give a number of results on the overall behavior of \(g_R(k)\) for \(p=2\) and \( p=3 \) for fixed \(k\) (as \(R\) varies), and fixed \(R\) (as \(k\) varies). - October 21, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
, Stellenbosch University, South Africa, will give a virtual talk on Large zeros of linear recurrence sequences. The talk will be co-hosted with the departmental colloquium. - September 16, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
Dr. Vefa Goksel gave a talk on Square patterns in dynamical orbits. - April 11, 2025: ASRM Speaker Series.
William Logan '09, FSA, gave a talk on Stable value fund dynamics: Understanding withdrawal patterns through experience studies. - April 8, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
Dr. Russell Hendel gave a talk on A family of sequences generalizing the Thue-Morse and Rudin-Shapiro sequences. - March 11, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
Dr. David Hubbard gave a talk on Computing the p-part of the class group. - March 4, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
Vishal Gupta, University of Delaware, gave a talk on the Minimum spectral radius in a given class of graphs. - February 25, 2025: Number Theory Seminar.
, US Naval Academy, gave a talk on Quasimodular forms, q-multiple zeta values, and partitions. - November 21, 2024: Number Theory Seminar.
, University of South Carolina, gave a talk on Disjoint covering systems. - November 15, 2024: ASRM Speaker Series.
Shelby Cimino, ASA, gave a talk on Actuarial modeling: An overview. - September 10, 2024: Number Theory Seminar.
, Johns Hopkins University, gave a talk on All trees on n edges decompose the complete bipartite graph \(K_{n,n}\). - August 20, 2024: Number Theory Seminar.
, Institut de Mathématiques de Jussieu, gave a talk on Expansion, divisibility and parity.
Recent Mathematics Seminar & Sabbatical Talks
- On April 7, 2025, Dr. Banghee So, gave a seminar on A Novel Neural Network Model with Predictive Power and Interpretability for Insurance Pricing.
- On March 24, 2025, Dr. Jing Tian presented a sabbatical lecture on Parameter Analysis in Continuous Data Assimilation for Various Turbulence Models.
- On February 24, 2025, Dr. Sebastian Calvo presented a seminar on the Waldschmidt constant of complex reflection groups.
- On October 16, 2024, Dr. Min Deng presented a sabbatical lecture on Bayesian Inference for the Loss Models via Mixture Priors.
- On September 30, 2024, Dr. Melike Kara Atas presented a sabbatical lecture on Improving Pre-Service Teachers’ Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching Fraction Concepts.