8:30-9:00 am Continental Breakfast, Name Tags Lounge

9:00-9:10 am Welcome B128

9:10-10:10 am Keynote Address B128

10:30-11:45 pm Student Talks B128, B104

11:45-1:00 pm Lunch *On your own

1:00-3:10 pm Panel Discussions B128, B104

3:10-3:45 pm Afternoon Snack Break Lounge

3:45-4:40 pm Student Talks B128, B104

4:45-5:00 pm Award Ceremony & Closing Remarks B128

Conference activities will take place will take place in the basement level of Fariborz Maseeh Hall (FMH).

*Lunch and dinner will be on your own. Portland State University hosts the Portland Farmers Market in the Park Blocks right behind Fariborz Maseeh Hall (FMH). See here for more information.

Nancy Neudauer, Pacific University

Title: Matroids You Have Known

Abstract: Matroids show up several times in the undergraduate curriculum, but most of us don’t know them by name. In 1933, three Harvard junior-fellows tied together some recurring themes in mathematics, into what Gian Carlo Rota called one of the most important ideas of our day. They were finding properties of dependence in multiple mathematical structures. What resulted is the matroid, which abstracts notions of algebraic dependence, linear independence, and geometric dependence, thus unifying several areas of mathematics. The usefulness of matroids to pure mathematical research is similar to that of groups – by studying an abstract version of phenomena that occur in different realms of mathematics, we learn something about all those realms simultaneously.

We find that matroids are everywhere: Vector spaces are matroids; We can define matroids on a graph. Matroids are useful in situations that are modelled by both graphs and matrices. Yet many matroids cannot be represented by a graph nor a collection of vectors over any field. We consider the essential role of matroids in combinatorial optimization.

No prior knowledge of matroids or graphs is needed.

Bio: Nancy Ann Neudauer is the Thomas and Joyce Holce Professor of Science at Pacific University and the Associate Secretary of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA). She received her MA and PhD in Mathematics, with a minor in Business and Law, and her BBA in Actuarial Science and Risk Management, all from the University of Wisconsin. Nancy is Co-Director of the Center for Undergraduate Research in Mathematics (CURM), Program Chair for the Cascadia Combinatorial Feast, and sits on the Board of Editors of the College Mathematics Journal and MAA FOCUS. She was the Visiting Mathematician to the national offices of the MAA, the Director of the MAA Dolciani Mathematics Enrichment Grant Program, a PI on the NSF-funded META Math (the Mathematical Education of Teachers as an Application of Mathematics) project, Associate Director for PNW Section NExT, and is the recipient of an MAA Distinguished Teaching Award and a Meritorious Service Award. Beyond her primary mathematical research in matroid theory, graph theory, and combinatorics, a current project is to build a research community of women mathematicians in Africa. As a Fulbright Specialist, her outreach extends to African Institute of Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) Centres in South Africa, Tanzania, Ghana, Cameroon, and Rwanda. She is particularly interested in bringing matroids to a wider audience by introducing them to working mathematicians and their students in every corner of the world.