Speaker:
Dr. Ronald Graham, Irwin and Joan Jacobs Professor, Department
of
Computer Science and Engineering, University of California San Diego
Abstract:
How many non-overlapping discs can be placed into a square of
side
?? This apparently simple question turns out to be surprisingly
difficult. The related question which asks for the maximum number of
non-overlapping unit squares which can be packed into a square of side ?
seems to be even harder! In this talk, I will summarize what is known and
what is not known about these (and related) classical geometrical
problems.
About the speaker:
Ron Graham has been one of the principal architects
of the rapid development worldwide of discrete mathematics in recent
years.
He has made many important research contributions to this subject,
including
the development, with Fan Chung, of the theory of quasirandom
combinatorial
And graphical families, Ramsey theory, the theory of packing and covering,
etc., as well as to the theory of numbers, and seminal contributions to
approximation algorithms and computational geometry (the Graham scan). He
was chief scientist at Bell Labs for many years and built it into a
world-class center for research in discrete mathematics and theoretical
computer science.
Graham has received the Plya Prize in Combinatorics from the Society for
Industrial and Applied Mathematics, the Euler Medal from the Institute of
Combinatorics and Its Applications, the Lester R. Ford Award from the
Mathematical Association of America (MAA), and the Carl Allendoerfer Award
from the MAA. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, a
foreign
member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences, a fellow of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, and past president of the International Jugglers
Association. He was an invited speaker at the International Congress of
Mathematicians in Warsaw in 1983 and was the AMS Gibbs Lecturer in 2000.
In
2003, Graham won the American Mathematical Society's annual Steele Prize
for
Lifetime Achievement.
Lunch will be served after the lecture.
Veselin Jungic
Associate Director
IRMACS
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