Salve Regina hosting international mathematics symposium

salvetoday Posted On June 3, 2013
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Salve Regina is hosting the International Symposium on Fractional PDEs: Theory, Numerics and Applications through Wednesday, June 5, with Dr. Ernest Rothman, professor of mathematical sciences, serving as the local organizer.

Fractional partial differential equations (FPDEs) are emerging as a new, powerful tool for modeling the most difficult type of complex systems, such as systems with overlapping microscopic and macroscopic scales or systems with long-range time memory and long-range spatial interactions.

“It’s an honor to be part of an international symposium on cutting-edge research in mathematics and it’s important for Salve Regina to host such events,” Rothman said. “It helps our students and prospective students realize that Salve Regina University is a fine, internationally known institution of higher learning, which offers significant academic opportunities across a variety of disciplines.”

The aim of this first U.S. workshop on FPDEs is to cover theory, algorithms and applications. Recent activity on FPDEs has taken place mostly in China and to a lesser degree in Europe; hence conference organizers invited their overseas colleagues to share with U.S. researchers the new advances in the methodology and applications of FPDEs.

“This particular symposium puts the spotlight on mathematics at Salve Regina, which had a record high number of graduates in mathematics this year,” Rothman said. “Such a symposium shows students that mathematics is an exciting field that is continually being developed; it is not merely a set of computational skills, developed long ago. Additionally, the symposium should show students that they’re not the only ones who struggle with mathematics. Students learn mathematics that is new to them, and the researchers do the same thing. Mathematical researchers embrace the struggle as an exciting challenge. Students enjoy mathematics when they do the same. And with its strong mathematics major, Salve Regina is an excellent place to do just that.”