Department of Mathematics Summer 2023 Newsletter

Over the years, Peter H. Rheinstein, mathematics, '63; M.S., mathematics, '64, has spent a significant amount of time involved in alumni activities at his medical school and law school alma maters - The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law. He was recently appointed to a second three-year term on the alumni board at Maryland Carey Law. In 2019 and 2020, Rheinstein served as president of the Academy of Medicine of Washington, D.C. He and his wife, Miriam, returned to the MSU campus for their 50-year class reunion.

Gary Evans, mathematics, '71, began umpiring intramural softball as an MSU freshman in the spring of 1968 to earn spending money for the grill at Wilson Hall. This led to a lifetime of umpiring and 35-plus years on the State Umpire Staff for USA Softball of Michigan teaching umpires. In 2017, he was inducted into the USA Softball National Hall of Fame.

Lisa (Daniel) Rasmussen, mathematics, '91, is retiring from Petoskey High School after 30 years in education. She taught high school mathematics and retired as the math department head.

Chris Tyler, computational mathematics, '01, a mathematics teacher at Waverly High School in Lansing, Mich., received a Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms Program award. Through the program, he was able to foster connections with teachers and students in the United States and in Ghana. He visited for two weeks with 11 other Fulbrighters, working with a host teacher to teach classes, and meeting with high-level officials as they look to implement huge reforms to their education system.

Jordan Vale, jazz studies, '15; mathematics, '16, has released a math-themed album with his funk band, Mr. Vale's Math Class, titled "We Can Help You Out." He was awarded a Make Learn Build grant from the Regional Arts and Culture Counsel (RACC); the band has been awarded an Arts3C grant from RACC. Vale left his position as assistant director at Mathnasium to tutor independently.

Chris Lemoine, mathematics, '21, accepted a full-time job as a faculty member in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Greenhills School in Ann Arbor, Mich.

Nikolai Ivanov, professor emeritus, retired in August 2022. His research is focused on topology and its interaction with other branches of mathematics, especially with the theory of Teichmüller spaces. Among his contributions are a classification of subgroups and the determination of virtual automorphisms of TeichmŸller modular groups. He received his Ph.D. from Steklov Mathematical Institute of USSR Academy of Sciences. He is a member of the inaugural Class of Fellows (2013) of the American Mathematical Society.

Jeanne Wald, professor emeritus, retired January 2023 after more than 40 years of exceptional instruction, mentoring, leadership and research in the department. Wald served as associate chair (1993-1996, 2009-2016) and undergraduate director (2009-2014). She established MSU's Mathematics Learning Center and three math department programs: Advanced Track, Community Outreach and International Student Exchange. Wald received numerous honors during her tenure including two departmental Frame Teaching Excellence Awards, MSU Women's Resource Center's Inspirational Woman of the Year Award (professional achievement) and the College of Natural Science's Teaching Excellence Award. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego.

Ilya Kachkovskiy received a two-year, $75,000 Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship in recognition of his accomplishments as an early career scientist. An international leader in transport in disordered media, Kachkovskiy will use his award for greater flexibility in balancing his teaching, research, travel and the support of graduate students and postdocs.

Aaron Levin, associate professor, received a 2023 Simons Fellowship to support his sabbatical leave during the 2023-24 academic year. Levin is an expert in number theory and arithmetic geometry. During his sabbatical, he plans to travel to several overseas institutions where he will pursue research on topics in Diophantine approximation and Diophantine geometry. 

Elizabeth Munch, associate professor, received a five-year, 2022 NSF Early CAREER Award. She will use her $507,462 award toward a new graduate-level graphical signatures course, an expanded seminar program and workshops on Topological Data Analysis. These activities will facilitate networking in the field, bringing new speakers to MSU, and will encourage interdisciplinary collaborations between junior researchers and domain scientists.

Keith Promislow, professor, was named a 2022 Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) Fellow for his contributions to rigorous asymptotic reductions, development of novel models and their applications, and service to the industrial and applied mathematics community.  The honor recognizes lifetime achievement in the application of mathematics to illuminate the structure of physical systems.

Guowei Wei, MSU Research Foundation Professor, was inducted into the prestigious American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) College of Fellows. Wei was recognized for outstanding contributions in mathematical molecular biosciences and drug discovery, and for predicting variants, infectivity, and vaccine breakthrough of SARS-CoV-2.

Three mathematics department members were recognized at the 2022 College of Natural Science awards ceremony last November. Brent Nelson, assistant professor, received a Teacher-Scholar award for excellence in teaching; Michael Brown, instructor, received a Teaching Prize for teaching excellence based on outstanding student evaluations and innovative, research-validated teaching methods; and Rachel Lund, teaching specialist, received the Ronald W. Wilson Endowed Teaching Award for teaching excellence in the integrative studies curriculum.

Samara Chamoun, a doctoral candidate in mathematics, was featured as MSU Educator of the Month in January 2023. She was recognized for being a passionate educator committed to enhancing the experience of her students and for helping to provide the best education possible.

Four mathematics students were among 15 MSU recipients named 2022 fellows of the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program- Isabella Ginnett, an Honors College senior majoring in advanced mathematics and physics; Spencer Lee, a graduate with bachelor's degrees in advanced mathematics and physics who is currently a Ph.D. student in computational mathematics, science and engineering; Andrew McDonald, a senior majoring in advanced mathematics and statistics; and Joseph Slivka, a graduate with bachelor's degrees in mathematics and physics who is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in physics at the University of California-Berkeley.

Nicholas Rekuski, a graduate student, received a 2022 MSU Excellence-in-Teaching Citation, awarded to teaching assistants who have distinguished themselves by the care they have given and the skill they have shown in meeting their classroom responsibilities. Rekuski was recognized for his dedication to improving undergraduate mathematics education and putting student engagement at the forefront of his teaching. 

Samuel Sottile, an MSU junior majoring in advanced mathematics, is among three MSU undergraduate students who are recipients of the nationally competitive Goldwater Scholarship for 2022. Sottile was also named a Churchill Scholar. He traveled to England following graduation to do one year of master's study at Churchill College, University of Cambridge.

Mathematicians at Michigan State University are using a five-year, $1.9 million National Science Foundation research training grant to amplify the university's success in math research by creating communities of undergraduates, graduates, post-graduates and faculty working in topology and related mathematical areas.

The goal: To create environments that nurture mentorship and connections and ultimately open doors to more inclusivity and broader recruitment.
Principal investigators of the initiative, "Algebraic and Geometric Topology at Michigan State," are mathematicians Teena Gerhardt, Matthew Hedden, Efstratia Kalfagianni and Matthew Stoffregen.

Topology is the study of shapes called "topological spaces," with a primary goal of determining when such shapes are the same or different. The topology group at MSU has a long tradition of mentoring graduate students and postdocs.
"This training grant will help us expand and build on this tradition," said Hedden. "We will be incorporating new mentoring practices and enhancing our existing professional development and research opportunities for students and postdocs."

While topologists, geometers and algebraists are often seen as working in separate mathematical areas, many striking advancements have resulted from communication and interaction between the disciplines. Hedden explained that the goal of strengthening these connections and collaborations underlies many of the grant's activities.

The grant supports 12 graduate students and four postdoctoral researchers who will help facilitate these collaborations between topology and other areas of mathematics, building on MSU's already strong reputation in the field.

Grant activities are also designed to strengthen what Hedden describes as "vertical" connections, formed between researchers at different career stages.

"We'll bring in strong mathematicians who are early in their career for the postdoctoral positions, and they'll interact with both senior faculty and graduate students," he said.

"Not only will we as faculty mentor them and learn from them, but the postdocs will learn about mentoring grad students. Similarly, graduate students and postdocs will play big roles with the undergraduate programs. These interactions strengthen the training of everyone in the group,  and ease transitions between career stages. Moreover, new mathematics will result as a byproduct."

The project also includes several activities aimed to draw undergraduate students into mathematics who, according to Hedden, "haven't already gone all-in on mathematics, people with high potential who might not yet see themselves as mathematicians."

For instance, grant funds will provide support for graduate students to mentor undergraduate freshmen, opening doors to a likely unfamiliar world that has a place for them in graduate school and as a career. There is a summer directed reading program, where undergraduate students are introduced to gateway topology topics such as knot theory, which asks: can this knotted loop of string be untied without cutting it?

"The activities supported by this grant will have a lasting impact on students and faculty," Gerhardt said. "It will strengthen our community of scholars and create new opportunities for both research and professional development."

Michigan State University could have been an intimidating place for the 17-year-old freshman from a small, rural community in southwestern Michigan. But because of the Charles Drew Science Enrichment Program (now known as the Charles Drew Science Scholars) it was an easy transition.

Rita Dandridge (B.S., mathematics, '89) always knew she would study mathematics, but she was not sure of her exact career path. Then she applied to MSU and got connected to the Charles Drew program.

"That program was a way for me to have community," Dandridge said. "I was nervous about going to a very large school after having been in a small school with a lot of people who looked like me. It was a way for me to find my own path and my own community immediately at MSU."

"I have friends who went through the Charles Drew program with me - and we remain friends today," she added.

Dandridge is currently a senior director in the Midwest division of Willis Towers Watson US, LLC in Southfield, Mich.

After earning her B.S. from MSU, she received a master's degree in actuarial mathematics from the University of Michigan in 1992.

Dandridge has continued her relationship with MSU in many capacities. She

was an industrial advisor for the Master of Science in Industrial Mathematics program when it was launched in the late 1990s; on the national board of directors for the MSU Black Alumni Association; and currently serves on the College of Natural Science (NatSci) Dean's Board of Advisors.

She was also the emcee for the annual NatSci Alumni Awards dinner in April 2023; was a panel member for the MSU Women in Philanthropy program in 2021; and supports the Dr. Paulette C. Walker Endowed Scholarship for Leaders.

"These are ways for me to create connection and maintain community with Michigan State," Dandridge said. 
In addition to giving of her time with students, faculty and staff to provide input and direction for the program, her participation has also included financial support.

She was excited to be able to establish the Rita Dandridge Endowment for Students in STEM in April 2022.

"It's important for me to pay it forward for students like me who are interested in a STEM-related field," she said. "It's a way for me to give perpetually, to support my objectives for ensuring a more diverse, inclusive educational experience for students' so they will be able to have the same opportunities as I had at MSU."

"What excites me most about maintaining a connection with MSU is that it gives me a view into the future in terms of problems that exist today that MSU is absolutely involved in - and how MSU is developing individuals and talent to help solve those problems," Dandridge added. "The research, and the ideas, and the thought processes . . .  it's just amazing to me. It gives you hope for the future."

Andrew Christlieb, MSU Research Foundation Professor, received a five-year, $15 million U.S. Department of Energy grant to establish the Center for Hierarchical and Robust Modeling of Non-Equilibrium Transport, or CHaRMNET - which focuses on developing new mathematical tools that will enable design of fusion energy systems from a first principles perspective. Christlieb and researchers at eight other universities and national labs across the country are developing new mathematical and computational tools to better model the physics needed to understand, control and sustain fusion. The MSU-led center is one of four new DOE Mathematical Multifaceted Integrated Capability Centers.

Matthew Hedden, Teena Gerhardt, Effie Kalfagianni and Matt Stoffregen received a five-year, $1.93 million National Science Foundation research training grant to amplify the university's success in math research by creating communities of undergraduates, graduates, post-graduates and faculty working in topology and related mathematical areas. The grant will strengthen connections among researchers at different career stages and in different research areas within algebraic and geometric topology and related disciplines. The aim is to create environments that nurture mentorship and connections, and ultimately open doors to more inclusivity and broader recruitment.

Keith Promislow, professor, is leading a five-year, $3 million NSF Research Traineeship Program grant to create a graduate program to train students to solve STEM problems with the power of machine learning and artificial intelligence. Combining these new methods with high-performance computing techniques will enable the discovery of new science and engineering applications of importance to society. The program aims to train future scientists to ensure that the United States maintains its leadership in machine learning.

Jeffrey Schenker, professor, received a three-year, $450,000 NSF grant to study quantum systems with time and space dependent disorder. The goal of this project is to deepen the theoretical and mathematical understanding of disorder effects in key models of the quantum evolution of "open" quantum systems, with non-negligible environment interactions. Progress in understanding the solutions to these equations will improve basic understanding of models of theoretical physics and applied mathematics.

Alexander "Sasha" Volberg, University Distinguished Professor, received a three-year, $298,000 NSF grant to better understand singular integrals, which feature heavily in the study of partial differential equations, with applications ranging from physics to engineering to quantum computing. The project will also provide opportunities for training junior mathematicians, including graduate students.

Guowei Wei, MSU Research Foundation Professor, received $540,234 as the second payment of a five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support the development of new mathematical tools and artificial intelligence (AI) models. Wei and his research team have built a comprehensive program for predicting SARS-CoV-2 variant infectivity and antibody disruption by integrating genomic analysis, AI, computational biophysics, advanced mathematics and experimental data. The predictive models will be implemented into a user-friendly platform with online servers for researchers to design mutation-proof new vaccines and antibody therapies.

Ilya Kachkovskiy, MSU associate professor, has established himself as a prominent mathematician in his field and brought recognition to the math department.

He works in a branch of mathematical physics called spectral theory - which he describes as "the language of the mathematically rigorous version of quantum mechanics."

In recent years, he has been working with collaborators on spectral theory of quasiperiodic operators, developing and using meticulous mathematical methods to study models of quantum particles that originate from quantum mechanics and solid-state physics. His impressive record of publication and external funding place him in the position of an international leader.

Kachkovskiy received a National Science Foundation (NSF) Early CAREER Faculty Award in 2019; a highly competitive NSF Focused Research Group (FRG) grant in 2021; and most recently an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship.

With the CAREER Award, Kachkovskiy is investigating his groundbreaking theory that particles in a non-randomized, or deterministic, environment may have physical properties similar to random ones. The grant also provides funds to partially support a postdoctoral position.

He will use the FRG grant to advance an already fruitful collaboration with his

former mentor - Svetlana Jitomirskaya - at the University of California Irvine; and Wencai Liu at Texas A&M.

Their aim is to expand new methods for analyzing small denominator problems to address unanswered questions related to quasiperiodic motion. It also provides funding for one or two postdocs who will have the invaluable opportunity to travel and interact with all three principal investigators."We want to understand how often and in what pattern a quasiperiodic system would return to a state that is very close to the initial state," Kachkovskiy said.
Quasiperiodic motion is threaded throughout nature, including the motion of planets, population dynamics in biology and quasicrystals found in solid state physics.

The FRG grant will also allow Kachkovskiy and his collaborators to further expand methods developed as part of his 2019 Early CAREER Award to construct quasiperiodic solutions to some classes of discrete non-linear Schrodinger equations.

Most recently, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship will enable Kachkovskiy to develop perturbative and non-perturbative methods in spectral theory and study Anderson localization and delocalization.

"Professionally, this fellowship will allow me to have more flexibility with balancing my teaching, research, travel and support of graduate students and postdocs," he said.

'Kachkovskiy received two Ph.D. degrees in mathematics - one from King's College London and one from the Steklov Institute in St. Petersburg (both in 2013). Prior to coming to MSU in 2017, he was a postdoc member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton.

"I believe that the development of methods and a better understanding of the mathematical picture are the main outcomes of our work," Kachkovskiy said. 

Michigan State University mathematician Franois Greer was honored as the inaugural Van Haften Endowed Professor in Deductive Literacy at an investiture ceremony held Nov. 3, 2022.

Greer is a leading young figure in the field of algebraic geometry. He studies enumerative algebraic geometry, modular forms and Hodge theory. He received his Ph.D. from Stanford in 2017 and held distinguished postdoctoral positions at the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics at Stony Brook and at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Greer joined MSU's mathematics department in August 2021 as an assistant professor.

Dan Van Haften, who received B.S. and M.S. degrees in mathematics from MSU in 1970, established the endowed professorship in honor of his parents, the late James and Esther Van Haften, who set a lifelong example of support for learning.

"I want to thank Dan for establishing this chair in deductive literacy. To determine the truth and to convince others of that truth, deductive thought is an indispensable tool," Greer said. "It's very humbling to be named the first Van Haften Professor. I do feel a strong mandate to carry on these high ideals that Van Haften stands for."

Greer's work in cutting-edge fields has already been published in some of the top journals in mathematics. He is an engaged teacher, has directed an undergraduate research group and co-organized the math department colloquium in 2021-2022.

"Franois is an excellent mathematician and a well-rounded professor," said Jeffrey Schenker, professor and chair of the Department of Mathematics.

"This professorship allows us to recruit a really excellent person and provide them with some acknowledgment, some extra resources at the beginning of their career where they can develop that into someone very successful."

"The bestowing of this professorship to Dr. Greer will help guarantee Michigan State's continued capacity to enhance its national and international reputation in algebraic geometry and ensure that students receive rigorous and rich classroom experiences around topics in this important and growing field," said Phil Duxbury, NatSci dean.

"Dr. Greer is a wonderful choice for this professorship; he has great academic credentials based on his work at Stony Brook and Princeton," said Van Haften, who gave remarks at the investiture. "It took a couple of years to find the right person [for the professorship] . . . It's a joy to have Dr. Greer as our inaugural Van Haften professor."

MSU Interim President Teresa K. Woodruff also participated in the ceremony to recognize and congratulate Greer.

"I am confident that Dr. Greer will continue making significant contributions to his field, and that he will play a strong leadership role at MSU, both as a faculty member and as a mentor to the next generation of leaders through undergraduate research and programs."