Computational Mathematics Gives You Wings

I'm a computational mathematician. My colleagues and I develop mathematical models for engineering or science applications, and write computational algorithms to simulate the models on high performance computers.

We use our algorithms to model fluid flow around airplanes or sails, in oil and gas reservoirs, in the ocean and atmosphere, or to optimize wind turbine placement in wind farms, study the dynamics of molecules or folding of proteins, find the best possible dose for cancer radiation, or analyze FMRI data of children with ADHD. But we also use our knowledge to build recommender systems, such as the ones used in Netflix or Amazon, to improve Google searches, or to discover cultural trends in Flickr data.
The amazing thing is that all these applications use similar building blocks. Building blocks that you are at the cusp of discovering and understanding.
In this talk, I will explain the similarities in the mathematical models and the computational algorithms across disciplines, and (I hope) open your eyes to the versatility and beauty of linear algebra and numerical analysis.

Speaker: Margot Gerritsen, Stanford University