Teaching

Current courses: Fall 2026

Office hours online by appointment, Zoom link.

Links to previous courses

Midnight breakfast study session, 1996 — Midnight breakfast study session in 1996. The student standing behind me is now a hotshot theoretical physicist.

Pages and links for undergraduate math topics

Archimedes Biography Page
Archimedes Palimpsest Page. The 1997 discovery of a long lost mathematical manuscript that reveals Archimedes' use of calculus.
The Best Careers for Math Majors in 2018. What can you really do with a math degree?
Biographies of mathematicians. Life stories of hundreds of mathematicians across the centuries. Click on “Full MacTutor biography” after finding the person you want.
Fermat's Last Theorem. A centuries old problem that was finally solved in 1995.
The Gabriel's horn paradox. Gabriel's Horn (also called Torricelli's trumpet) is a figure invented by Evangelista Torricelli which has infinite surface area, but finite volume. This is explained in Math 162.
Galois page. The tragic story of the mathematician whose visionary work is the subject of a course (Math 237) taught in every major university and who was killed in a duel at the age of 20.
Gauss page. His mathematical abilities and exploits caused his contemporaries to dub him princeps, and biographers customarily place him on a par with Archimedes and Newton.
Sophie Germain. The 18th-century woman who assumed a man's identity in order to pursue her passion for mathematics.
Benoit Mandelbrot. The father of fractal geometry.
The Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search. How you can use your computer to discover the largest known prime number.
Mathematical Aphrodisiac. You have to try this.
Origami constructions. Learn how to trisect an angle by folding paper, something that cannot be done with ruler and compass.
Quintic equations page. It is known that there is no formula for the general solution to a polynomial equation of degree 5 or higher. This is a consequence of the famous theorem of Galois, which is taught in Math 237.
Ramanujan page. Read about the self trained Indian mathematical genius who dazzled Cambridge mathematicians in 1913.
Research Experience for Undergraduates. A big list of summer programs maintained by the American Mathematical Society.
Ruler and Compass. Classical Greek geometry.
Alan Turing page. The father of computer science and war hero who was prosecuted for being gay.
Wallpaper groups. This topic is extensively documented on the web perhaps because of its great visual appeal.
Why are there so many prime numbers? Slides for my SUMS talk of September 22, 2026. Earlier version for SUMS, October 15, 2008: Slides Alternate version with white background.
Zeno's Paradox Page. Calculus provides the solution to a 2000 year old riddle.