Monograph Books - Böcker

The book consists of thirty lectures on diverse topics, covering much of the mathematical landscape rather than focusing on one area. The reader will learn numerous results that often belong to neither the standard undergraduate nor graduate curriculum and will discover connections between classical and contemporary ideas in algebra, combinatorics, geometry, and topology. The reader's effort will be rewarded in seeing the harmony of each subject. The common thread in the selected subjects is their illustration of the unity and beauty of mathematics. Most lectures contain exercises, and solutions or answers are given to selected exercises. A special feature of the book is an abundance of drawings (more than four hundred), artwork by an accomplished artist, and about a hundred portraits of mathematicians. Almost every lecture contains surprises for even the seasoned researcher.

There are many bits and pieces of folklore in mathematics that are passed down from advisor to student, or from collaborator to collaborator, but which are too fuzzy and non-rigorous to be discussed in the formal literature. Traditionally, it was a matter of luck and location as to who learned such folklore mathematics. But today, such bits and pieces can be communicated effectively and efficiently via the semiformal medium of research blogging. This book grew from such a blog.In 2007, Terry Tao began a mathematical blog, as an outgrowth of his own website at UCLA. This book is based on a selection of articles from the first year of that blog. These articles discuss a wide range of mathematics and its applications, ranging from expository articles on quantum mechanics, Einstein's equation E = mc2, or compressed sensing, to open problems in analysis, combinatorics, geometry, number theory, and algebra, to lecture series on random matrices, Fourier analysis, or the dichotomy between structure and randomness that is present in many subfields of mathematics, to more philosophical discussions on such topics as the interplay between finitary and infinitary in analysis.Some selected commentary from readers of the blog has also been included at the end of each article. While the articles vary widely in subject matter and level, they should be broadly accessible to readers with a general graduate mathematics background; the focus in many articles is on the 'big picture' and on informal discussion, with technical details largely being left to the referenced literature.

Who would have thought that listing the positive integers along with their most remarkable properties could end up being such an engaging and stimulating adventure? The author uses this approach to explore elementary and advanced topics in classical number theory. A large variety of numbers are contemplated: Fermat numbers, Mersenne primes, powerful numbers, sublime numbers, Wieferich primes, insolite numbers, Sastry numbers, voracious numbers, to name only a few. The author also presents short proofs of miscellaneous results and constantly challenges the reader with a variety of old and new number theory conjectures. This book becomes a platform for exploring new concepts such as the index of composition and the index of isolation of an integer. In addition, the book displays several tables of particular families of numbers, including the list of all 88 narcissistic numbers and the list of the eight known numbers which are not prime powers but which can be written as the sum of the cubes of their prime factors, and in each case with the algorithm used to create them.

This entertaining book presents a collection of 180 famous mathematical puzzles and intriguing elementary problems that great mathematicians have posed, discussed, and/or solved. The selected problems do not require advanced mathematics, making this book accessible to a variety of readers. Mathematical recreations offer a rich playground for both amateur and professional mathematicians. Believing that creative stimuli and aesthetic considerations are closely related, great mathematicians from ancient times to the present have always taken an interest in puzzles and diversions. The goal of this book is to show that famous mathematicians have all communicated brilliant ideas, methodological approaches, and absolute genius in mathematical thoughts by using recreational mathematics as a framework. Concise biographies of many mathematicians mentioned in the text are also included. The majority of the mathematical problems presented in this book originated in number theory, graph theory, optimization, and probability. Others are based on combinatorial and chess problems, while still others are geometrical and arithmetical puzzles. This book is intended to be both entertaining as well as an introduction to various intriguing mathematical topics and ideas. Certainly, many stories and famous puzzles can be very useful to prepare classroom lectures, to inspire and amuse students, and to instill affection for mathematics.

Number theory is one of the few areas of mathematics where problems of substantial interest can be fully described to someone with minimal mathematical background. Solving such problems sometimes requires difficult and deep methods. But this is not a universal phenomenon; many engaging problems can be successfully attacked with little more than one's mathematical bare hands. In this case one says that the problem can be solved in an elementary way. Such elementary methods and the problems to which they apply are the subject of this book. ""Not Always Buried Deep"" is designed to be read and enjoyed by those who wish to explore elementary methods in modern number theory. The heart of the book is a thorough introduction to elementary prime number theory, including Dirichlet's theorem on primes in arithmetic progressions, the Brun sieve, and the Erdos-Selberg proof of the prime number theorem. Rather than trying to present a comprehensive treatise, Pollack focuses on topics that are particularly attractive and accessible. Other topics covered include Gauss' theory of cyclotomy and its applications to rational reciprocity laws, Hilbert's solution to Waring's problem, and modern work on perfect numbers. The nature of the material means that little is required in terms of prerequisites: the reader is expected to have prior familiarity with number theory at the level of an undergraduate course and a first course in modern algebra (covering groups, rings, and fields). The exposition is complemented by over 200 exercises and 400 references.

There are many bits and pieces of folklore in mathematics that are passed down from advisor to student, or from collaborator to collaborator, but which are too fuzzy and non-rigorous to be discussed in the formal literature. Traditionally, it was a matter of luck and location as to who learned such folklore mathematics. But today, such bits and pieces can be communicated effectively and efficiently via the semiformal medium of research blogging. This book grew from such a blog. In 2007, Terry Tao began a mathematical blog to cover a variety of topics, ranging from his own research and other recent developments in mathematics, to lecture notes for his classes, to non-technical puzzles and expository articles. The articles from the first year of that blog have already been published by the AMS. The posts from 2008 are being published in two volumes. This book is Part II of the second-year posts, focusing on geometry, topology, and partial differential equations. The major part of the book consists of lecture notes from Tao's course on the Poincare conjecture and its recent spectacular solution by Perelman. The course incorporates a review of many of the basic concepts and results needed from Riemannian geometry and, to a lesser extent, from parabolic PDE. The aim is to cover in detail the high-level features of the argument, along with selected specific components of that argument, while sketching the remaining elements, with ample references to more complete treatments. The lectures are as self-contained as possible, focusing more on the 'big picture' than on technical details. In addition to these lectures, a variety of other topics are discussed, including expository articles on topics such as gauge theory, the Kakeya needle problem, and the Black-Scholes equation. Some selected comments and feedback from blog readers have also been incorporated into the articles. The book is suitable for graduate students and research mathematicians interested in broad exposure to mathematical topics.

The $3x 1$ problem, or Collatz problem, concerns the following seemingly innocent arithmetic procedure applied to integers: If an integer $x$ is odd then ""multiply by three and add one"", while if it is even then ""divide by two"". The $3x 1$ problem asks whether, starting from any positive integer, repeating this procedure over and over will eventually reach the number 1. Despite its simple appearance, this problem is unsolved. Generalizations of the problem are known to be undecidable, and the problem itself is believed to be extraordinarily difficult. This book reports on what is known on this problem. It consists of a collection of papers, which can be read independently of each other. The book begins with two introductory papers, one giving an overview and current status, and the second giving history and basic results on the problem. These are followed by three survey papers on the problem, relating it to number theory and dynamical systems, to Markov chains and ergodic theory, and to logic and the theory of computation. The next paper presents results on probabilistic models for behavior of the iteration. This is followed by a paper giving the latest computational results on the problem, which verify its truth for $x < 5.4 \cdot 10^{18}$. The book also reprints six early papers on the problem and related questions, by L. Collatz, J. H. Conway, H. S. M. Coxeter, C. J. Everett, and R. K. Guy, each with editorial commentary. The book concludes with an annotated bibliography of work on the problem up to the year 2000.

There are many bits and pieces of folklore in mathematics that are passed down from advisor to student, or from collaborator to collaborator, but which are too fuzzy and nonrigorous to be discussed in the formal literature. Traditionally, it was a matter of luck and location as to who learned such "folklore mathematics". But today, such bits and pieces can be communicated effectively and efficiently via the semiformal medium of research blogging. This book grew from such a blog. In 2007 Terry Tao began a mathematical blog to cover a variety of topics, ranging from his own research and other recent developments in mathematics, to lecture notes for his classes, to nontechnical puzzles and expository articles. The first two years of the blog have already been published by the American Mathematical Society. The posts from the third year are being published in two volumes. This second volume contains a broad selection of mathematical expositions and self-contained technical notes in many areas of mathematics, such as logic, mathematical physics, combinatorics, number theory, statistics, theoretical computer science, and group theory. Tao has an extraordinary ability to explain deep results to his audience, which has made his blog quite popular. Some examples of this facility in the present book are the tale of two students and a multiple-choice exam being used to explain the $P = NP$ conjecture and a discussion of "no self-defeating object" arguments that starts from a schoolyard number game and ends with results in logic, game theory, and theoretical physics. The first volume consists of a second course in real analysis, together with related material from the blog, and it can be read independently.

There are many bits and pieces of folklore in mathematics that are passed down from advisor to student, or from collaborator to collaborator, but which are too fuzzy and non-rigorous to be discussed in the formal literature. Traditionally, it was a matter of luck and location as to who learned such ""folklore mathematics"". But today, such bits and pieces can be communicated effectively and efficiently via the semiformal medium of research blogging. This book grew from such a blog.The articles, essays, and notes in this book are derived from the author's mathematical blog in 2010. It contains a broad selection of mathematical expositions, commentary, and self-contained technical notes in many areas of mathematics, such as logic, group theory, analysis, and partial differential equations. The topics range from the foundations of mathematics to discussions of recent mathematical breakthroughs.Lecture notes from the author's courses that appeared on the blog have been published separately in the Graduate Studies in Mathematics series

This book provides a quick, but very readable introduction to stochastic differential equations—that is, to differential equations subject to additive "white noise" and related random disturbances. The exposition is strongly focused upon the interplay between probabilistic intuition and mathematical rigour. Topics include a quick survey of measure theoretic probability theory, followed by an introduction to Brownian motion and the Ito stochastic calculus, and finally the theory of stochastic differential equations. The text also includes applications to partial differential equations, optimal stopping problems and options pricing. This book can be used as a text for senior undergraduates or beginning graduate students in mathematics, applied mathematics, physics, financial mathematics, etc., who want to learn the basics of stochastic differential equations. The reader is assumed to be fairly familiar with measure theoretic mathematical analysis, but is not assumed to have any particular knowledge of probability theory (which is rapidly developed in Chapter 2 of the book).

Why are mathematicians drawn to art? How do they perceive it? What motivates them to pursue excellence in music or painting? Do they view their art as a conveyance for their mathematics or an escape from it? What are the similarities between mathematical talent and creativity and their artistic equivalents? What are the differences? Can a theatrical play or a visual image capture the beauty and excitement of mathematics? Some of the world's top mathematicians are also accomplished artists: musicians, photographers, painters, dancers, writers, filmmakers. In this volume, they share some of their work and reflect on the roles that mathematics and art have played in their lives. They write about creativity, communication, making connections, negotiating successes and failures, and navigating the vastly different professional worlds of art and mathematics.

This book is a unique teaching tool that takes math lovers on a journey designed to motivate kids (and kids at heart) to learn the fun of factoring and prime numbers. This volume visually explores the concepts of factoring and the role of prime and composite numbers. The playful and colorful monsters are designed to give children (and even older audiences) an intuitive understanding of the building blocks of numbers and the basics of multiplication. The introduction and appendices can also help adult readers answer questions about factoring from their young audience. The artwork is crisp and creative and the colors are bright and engaging, making this volume a welcome deviation from standard math texts.Any person, regardless of age, can profit from reading this book. Readers will find themselves returning to its pages for a very long time, continually learning from and getting to know the monsters as their knowledge expands. You Can Count on Monsters is a magnificent addition for any math education program and is enthusiastically recommended to every teacher, parent and grandparent, student, child, or other individual interested in exploring the visually fascinating world of the numbers 1 through 100.

In Really Big Numbers, mathematician and author, Richard Evan Schwartz, leads math lovers of all ages on an innovative and strikingly illustrated journey through the infinite number system. By means of engaging, imaginative visuals and endearing narration, Schwartz manages the monumental task of presenting the complex concept of Big Numbers in fresh and relatable ways. The book begins with small, easily observable numbers before building up to truly gigantic ones, like a nonillion, a tredecillion, a googol, and even ones too huge for names!Readers will find themselves returning to its pages for a very long time, perpetually learning from and growing with the narrative as their knowledge deepens. Really Big Numbers is a wonderful enrichment for any math education program and is enthusiastically recommended to every teacher, parent and grandparent, student, child, or other individual interested in exploring the vast universe of numbers.You Can Count on Monsters: The First 100 Numbers and Their Characters is a unique teaching tool that takes math lovers on a journey designed to motivate kids (and kids at heart) to learn the fun of factoring and prime numbers. This volume visually explores the concepts of factoring and the role of prime and composite numbers. The playful and colorful monsters are designed to give children (and even older audiences) an intuitive understanding of the building blocks of numbers and the basics of multiplication. The introduction and appendices can also help adult readers answer questions about factoring from their young audience. The artwork is crisp and creative and the colors are bright and engaging, making this volume a welcome deviation from standard math texts.Readers will find themselves returning to its pages for a very long time, continually learning from and getting to know the monsters as their knowledge expands. You Can Count on Monsters is a magnificent addition for any math education program and is enthusiastically recommended to every teacher, parent and grandparent, student, child, or other individual interested in exploring the visually fascinating world of the numbers 1 through 100. Any person, regardless of age, can profit from reading these books.

This is the second edition of a book originally published in 1997. Today the internet virtually consumes all of our lives (especially the lives of writers). As both readers and writers, we are all aware of blogs, chat rooms, and preprint servers. There are now electronic-only journals and print-on-demand books, Open Access journals and joint research projects such as MathOverflow—not to mention a host of other new realities. It truly is a brave new world, one that can be overwhelming and confusing. The truly new feature of this second edition is an extensive discussion of technological developments. Similar to the first edition, Krantz's frank and straightforward approach makes this book particularly suitable as a textbook for an undergraduate course.

Pay a visit to the Infinite Farm! In Life on the Infinite Farm, mathematician and award-winning children's book author Richard Schwartz teaches about infinity and curved space through stories of whimsical farm animals. Join Gracie, the shoe-loving cow with infinitely many feet, Hammerwood, the gum-loving crocodile with an endless mouth, and their friends as they navigate the challenges that come with being infinitely large. Children as young as 5 will enjoy the lighthearted illustrations and the fanciful approach to infinity. Older students (and even adult professional mathematicians) will also appreciate the more advanced ideas and geometric references. The two approaches are woven together to appeal to a wide audience, from budding mathematicians to hardcore geometers.

Differential Equations: Techniques, Theory, and Applications is designed for a modern first course in differential equations either one or two semesters in length. The organization of the book interweaves the three components in the subtitle, with each building on and supporting the others. Techniques include not just computational methods for producing solutions to differential equations, but also qualitative methods for extracting conceptual information about differential equations and the systems modeled by them. Theory is developed as a means of organizing, understanding, and codifying general principles. Applications show the usefulness of the subject as a whole and heighten interest in both solution techniques and theory. Formal proofs are included in cases where they enhance core understanding; otherwise, they are replaced by informal justifications containing key ideas of a proof in a more conversational format. Applications are drawn from a wide variety of fields: those in physical science and engineering are prominent, of course, but models from biology, medicine, ecology, economics, and sports are also featured.The 1,400 exercises are especially compelling. They range from routine calculations to large-scale projects. The more difficult problems, both theoretical and applied, are typically presented in manageable steps. The hundreds of meticulously detailed modeling problems were deliberately designed along pedagogical principles found especially effective in the MAA study Characteristics of Successful Calculus Programs, namely, that asking students to work problems that require them to grapple with concepts (or even proofs) and do modeling activities is key to successful student experiences and retention in STEM programs. The exposition itself is exceptionally readable, rigorous yet conversational. Students will find it inviting and approachable. The text supports many different styles of pedagogy from traditional lecture to a flipped classroom model. The availability of a computer algebra system is not assumed, but there are many opportunities to incorporate the use of one.

Mathematicians is a remarkable collection of ninety-two photographic portraits, featuring a selection of the most impressive mathematicians of our time. Acclaimed photographer Mariana Cook captures the exuberance and passion of these brilliant thinkers. The superb images are accompanied by autobiographical texts written by each mathematician. Together, the photographs and words illuminate a diverse group of men and women dedicated to the absorbing pursuit of mathematics.The compelling black-and-white portraits introduce readers to mathematicians who are both young and old and from notably diverse backgrounds. They include Fields Medal winners, those at the beginning of major careers, and those who are long-established celebrities in the discipline. Their candid personal essays reveal unique and wide-ranging thoughts, opinions, and humor. The mathematicians discuss how they became interested in mathematics, why they love the subject, how they remain motivated in the face of mathematical challenges, and how their greatest contributions have paved new directions for future generations. Mathematicians in the book include Jean-Pierre Serre, Henri Cartan, Karen Uhlenbeck, David Blackwell, Eli Stein, John Conway, Timothy Gowers, Frances Kirwan, Peter Lax, William Massey, John Milnor, Cathleen Morawetz, John Nash, Pierre Deligne, and James Simons.This book conveys the beauty and joy of mathematics to readers outside the field as well as those in it. These pictures and their texts are an inspiration, and a perfect gift for those who love mathematics as well as for those who think they can't do it!

November 11, 2002: Grigori Perelman, a famous mathematician, brilliantly establishes his proof of the Poincare Conjecture. A few years later, he is widely acclaimed for his research. However, he declines the prestigious Fields Medal and persists in not wanting to leave his native city of Saint Petersburg to attend the International Congress of Mathematicians in Madrid in 2006 where the medal is supposed to be awarded. John Ball, the President of the International Mathematical Union, decided to visit Russia in an attempt to convince Perelman to accept the Fields Medal. This book contains the story, part real, part fictional, of the exchanges between Ball and Perelman. We are immersed in the tormented mind of a person who prefers the simple and secluded life to the prestige of his discoveries. We already know the final outcome of the story, Perelman's perpetual refusal to be glorified by the public, and yet there is still much to learn from this character of astonishing complexity.

The purpose of this handbook is to help launch institutional transformations in mathematics departments to improve student success. We report findings from the Student Engagement in Mathematics through an Institutional Network for Active Learning (SEMINAL) study. SEMINAL's purpose is to help change agents, those looking to (or currently attempting to) enact change within mathematics departments and beyond--trying to reform the instruction of their lower division mathematics courses in order to promote high achievement for all students. SEMINAL specifically studies the change mechanisms that allow postsecondary institutions to incorporate and sustain active learning in Precalculus to Calculus 2 learning environments. Out of the approximately 2.5 million students enrolled in collegiate mathematics courses each year, over 90% are enrolled in Precalculus to Calculus 2 courses. Forty-four percent of mathematics departments think active learning mathematics strategies are important for Precalculus to Calculus 2 courses, but only 15percnt; state that they are very successful at implementing them. Therefore, insights into the following research question will help with institutional transformations: What conditions, strategies, interventions and actions at the departmental and classroom levels contribute to the initiation, implementation, and institutional sustainability of active learning in the undergraduate calculus sequence (Precalculus to Calculus 2) across varied institutions?This book is published in cooperation with CBMS.

This book is about the life of primes. Indeed, once they are defined, primes take on a life of their own and the mysteries surrounding them begin multiplying, just like living cells reproduce themselves, and there seems to be no end to it. This monograph takes the reader on a journey through time, providing an accessible overview of the numerous prime number theory problems that mathematicians have been working on since Euclid. Topics are presented in chronological order as episodes. These include results on the distribution of primes, from the most elementary to the proof of the famous prime number theorem. The book also covers various primality tests and factorisation algorithms. It is then shown how our inability to factor large integers has allowed mathematicians to create today's most secure encryption method. Computer science buffs may be tempted to tackle some of the many open problems appearing in the episodes. Throughout the presentation, the human side of mathematics is displayed through short biographies that give a glimpse of the lives of the people who contributed to the life of primes. Each of the 37 episodes concludes with a series of problems (many with solutions) that will assist the reader in gaining a better understanding of the theory.

The articles in this volume grew out of a 2019 workshop, held at Johns Hopkins University, that was inspired by a belief that when mathematicians take time to reflect on the social forces involved in the production of mathematics, actionable insights result. Topics range from mechanisms that lead to an inclusion-exclusion dichotomy within mathematics to common pitfalls and better alternatives to how mathematicians approach teaching, mentoring and communicating mathematical ideas.This collection will be of interest to students, faculty and administrators wishing to gain a snapshot of the current state of professional norms within mathematics and possible steps toward improvements.

An Illustrated Theory of Numbers gives a comprehensive introduction to number theory, with complete proofs, worked examples, and exercises. Its exposition reflects the most recent scholarship in mathematics and its history. Almost 500 sharp illustrations accompany elegant proofs, from prime decomposition through quadratic reciprocity. Geometric and dynamical arguments provide new insights and allow for a rigorous approach with less algebraic manipulation. The final chapters contain an extended treatment of binary quadratic forms, using Conway's topograph to solve quadratic Diophantine equations (e.g., Pell's equation) and to study reduction and the finiteness of class numbers. Data visualizations introduce the reader to open questions and cutting-edge results in analytic number theory such as the Riemann hypothesis, boundedness of prime gaps, and the class number 1 problem. Accompanying each chapter, historical notes curate primary sources and secondary scholarship to trace the development of number theory within and outside the Western tradition. Requiring only high school algebra and geometry, this text is recommended for a first course in elementary number theory. It is also suitable for mathematicians seeking a fresh perspective on an ancient subject. In this updated edition, you will find a new chapter which brings the reader from undergraduate calculus into analytic number theory. A new section adds a second proof of quadratic reciprocity due to Gauss and Eisenstein. Hundreds of minor edits correct and improve the original edition.