Lecturer: Dr Moez Draief
Dr
Moez Draief graduated from the Ecole Polytechnique in 2000 (the most prestigious
French engineering school) where he studied mathematics and statistical physics.
In 2001, he did a postgraduate diploma in Probability theory and Applications at
the University Paris 6 (Jussieu). He was also a research assistant from 2001 to
2004 at the University Paris 7(Jussieu) working on the broad area of the
mathematics of systems. He also taught and supervised undergraduate students.
After completing his PhD, he joined the Statistical laboratory (University of Cambridge) as a research associate. During his first year at the Statslab, he worked on various problems relating to the modelling of wireless networks in collaboration with people from Microsoft Research (Cambridge) and France Telecom R&D (London). Moreover he supervised undergraduate and graduate students in various courses proposed by his laboratory. He is currently a Marie Curie Research Fellow from 2005 to 2007 (a very competitive fellowship funded by the European Union). During these two years he will be conducting his research on the analysis of interaction networks appearing in various contexts such as communication networks, social networks, networks of firms. In addition to this, he will be teaching a Part III (graduate) course on the "Spread of Epidemics and Rumours".
Discrete mathematics is the kind of mathematics one needs to know to communicate with a computer. It is thus necessary for most students, regardless of their choice of career path. In fact, discrete mathematics affords many students, who have encountered numerous difficulties with computation and the complexities of mathematics in the past, a new opportunity to experience success and enjoyment in mathematics classes. Those can be reached with appealing problems from discrete mathematics that require few formal skills.
Discrete mathematics problems can be applied to interesting real-world applications; and lend themselves well to situations in which students collaborate and develop verbal and written skills in the process of solving the problem. In addition, it promotes making mathematical connections within and across disciplines through a wide range of problem types.
During the WSP, we will explore various aspects of discrete mathematics with connection to natural numbers and the study of their properties. We will conclude the course by presenting an application of this material to the analysis of card shuffling.