Student Research

Every Alleghenian completes a Senior Project in his or her major field—a significant piece of original work, designed by the student and a faculty advisor, that demonstrates to employers and graduate schools the ability to complete a major assignment, to work independently, to analyze and synthesize information, and to write and speak persuasively.

Some noteworthy Senior Projects in mathematics:

  • “Application and Analysis of Burnside’s Theorem”
  • “A Simple Solution to Euler’s Genoan Lottery Problem”
  • “Computing Jones Polynomials for Knots and Links Using Braid Words”
  • “The Sylow Theorems”
  • “Three Theorems of Kakutani and von Neumann and Their Application to Economics”
  • “The Probability and Moment-Generating Functions for Elementary Patterns of Coin Tossing”
  • “Dirichlet Norms of Composition Operators Generated by Univalent Full-Mappings”

Other Research

  • “A Value for Zero-monotonic Partially Defined Games,” student-faculty summer research project funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
  • Students often are involved in one-semester independent projects at research centers such as Oakridge, Brookhaven, Woods Hole, and Argonne.

Student Achievements

  • Approximately four students annually attend at least one meeting of a professional mathematical association.
  • Two students were recently accepted into Undergraduate Summer Research Programs—one at the University of Tennessee and the other at Northern Arizona University. One presented a paper on his research results at the Joint American Mathematics Society–Mathematics Association of America meeting in San Francisco.
  • Senior mathematics majors often present their Senior Projects at professional mathematics conferences.
  • As a result of a summer NSF Student Research Grant, an Allegheny student had two papers on finite group theory published in a refereed journal that accepts only papers containing original results.
  • Several students have attended the George Washington University Summer Program for Women in Mathematics, for talented undergraduate women contemplating graduate school in the mathematical sciences.