Sam Simon
I recently defended my PhD in Mathematics at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver. Based on the exposition of my work and presentation, I was awarded the degree with with distinction. My areas of research include combinatorics under the supervision of Marni Mishna (with an analytic flavor) and Jonathan Jedwab (combinatorial designs/coding theory). I completed my Masters degree in Mathematics under the co-supervision of Jonathan Jedwab and Marni Mishna at SFU. I completed my undergrad at Carnegie Mellon University, where I double majored in Math and Physics.
My main area of study is combinatorics. I love finding patterns among objects and discovering what properties drive their behavior. My current area of work is in lattice paths, where I use analytic combinatorics to determine the asymptotics of certain weighted walks in a given region. I also am working on finding additional structure within Hadamard matrices. In the past few years I have been entering the world of data science and machine learning. I participated in the 2021 Math to the Power Industry workshop where I worked on a project looking at voting data for the Canadian legislature. In 2023, I completed the SFU Data Fellowship: AI Essentials course.
I am involved in the following communities at SFU
Discrete Math Seminar
Amnesty International
Math Graduate Support (weekly sessions which I started as a way to share and ease some of the mental health problems that are frequent in grad school)
Math Graduate Caucus (served as President for two terms and Vice President as one term)
Math Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Learning Group
Sexual Assault Awareness Month Committee