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Steven J. Miller Associate Professor of Mathematics, Williams College 202 Bronfman Science Center, 413-???-???? (Steven.J.Miller AT williams.edu) Click here for my schedule
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curriculum
vita
research statement
teaching statement
Welcome letter
to Williams Students
Possible
thesis / colloquium projects
Opportunities in
Mathematics (REUs, gradschool)
photos of Cam
and Kayla |
Greetings! I arrived at Williams in 2008. I've known several graduates and members of the faculty for years, and my family and I are excited to be part of the community. We joined the 5 College area in Fall 2011 (with Liz teaching at UMass and me taking sabbaticals at Smith and Mount Holyoke). I've been a faculty program director for Spencer Neighborhood, and enjoyed all the great events with the students, and hope to resume involvement with the neighborhoods when I return in Fall 2012.
I wanted to briefly introduce myself by providing some personal and professional information. I received a BS in Mathematics and Physics from Yale in 1996, and then earned a PhD in Mathematics from Princeton in 2002. Since then I've taught at Princeton, New York University, (The) Ohio State University (GO BUCKS!) and Brown. I'm married; my wife Liz is a professor of Marketing at UMass Amherst, and we have a son Cameron and a daughter Kayla. I grew up just outside Boston. My hobbies outside math include tennis, sailing, reading (primarily historical fiction, politics and science fiction), Boston sports teams, bridge and twistie art. In previous years I served as faculty advisor to the Brown chess club, and I currently maintain a math riddles page (which is usually among the top ten hits when googling math riddles; it's being greatly improved by three Williams students as part of the WIT program, and is online at mathriddles.williams.edu). I'm also an early riser, and enjoy starting the day by having breakfast with friends (I'm currently the President of the International Federation of Collegiate Breakfast Clubs, so if you're ever in Oxford and want a free meal, let me know!). For the past N summers I've run an undergraduate research group as part of SMALL here at Williams, as well as serving as a research mentor to high school students at the PROMYS program at BU and talking at Hampshire College's program.
One of the reasons I love studying math is that there must be a reason for
each answer, and that reason is not 'because I said so!'. I find it amazing that
many very different phenomena can be explained by the same basic equations (for
example, the same math used to analyze the Fibonacci numbers 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,…
can be used to teach you why playing roulette at Vegas is a terrible idea). My
main research is in number theory and probability, especially some
problems on the boundary of math and physics. For example, there are many
similarities between the behavior of primes and the energy levels of heavy
nuclei such as Uranium! This is a specific example of a very general
phenomenon, namely how results and observations in one field can suggest
problems (and sometimes solutions) in another. In addition to research in
pure mathematics, in the last few years I have written papers in accounting, baseball, computer science, economics,
geology and
marketing. I've supervised over 150 undergraduates in the past 10
years (several of whom only knew basic calculus), and I try to have open research projects in my classes. If you are interested
in undergraduate research, please drop me a line -- I'm interested in almost
anything that relates to math (for those interested in a senior thesis or
colloquium, click here for a more detailed list). Some of my current projects with undergraduates
include a collaboration with the San Diego Padres (I'm a huge
Red Sox fan, but
some of my students are Yankee fans, so we figured this is a nice, neutral team)
and working with the
IRS to detect tax fraud,
as well as some problems in number theory and dynamical systems. I've written a
number theory
book (the link will take you to a webpage with links to some student reports
and background papers), and am currently writing a probability book with a
Williams student.
I've taught many classes over the years; links to
them are available from my main homepage. These include
Math 103 (Calculus I), Math 209
(Differential Equations and Vector Analysis),
Math 406 (Analysis and Number Theory),
Math 341 (Probability), an independent course
in Sabermetrics,
Math 10 (Lqwurgxfwlrq Wr Fubswrjudskb) for
Winter Study,
Math 302 (Complex Analysis), a tutorial in number theory (Math
308/406). an
independent study in Problem Solving (especially to prepare for the Putnam)
in the fall, and Math Math 105 (Multivariable
Calculus). I've also run the Williams' Green Chicken Team
(it's a lot of fun; we have weekly dinners where we discuss interesting math
competitions).