By Jenny Wells

UK Mathematics Alumni Aleams Barra served as the team leader for the 2016 International Math Olympiad team from Indonesia. The six members of the Indonesian team earned three silver medals and three bronze medals. The team finished 20th in the unofficial team rankings.

Aleams earned his Ph.D. at Kentucky under the direction of Heide Gluesing-Luerssen in 2012.

by Guy Spriggs

In organizing its spring 2016 information meeting for majors, the UK Department of Mathematics solicited faculty to give the closing address. Professor Richard Ehrenborg volunteered, but suggested a less traditional approach.

“I said I wasn’t going to give a talk,” he recalled. “I was going to do a show.”

Instead of giving a lecture on new developments in the field or solving complex equations on the chalkboard, Ehrenborg led volunteers and spectators through tricks involving playing cards and simple geometric shapes. In short order, he was able to predict a single card’s location in a shuffled deck and prove that 168 and 169 are actually equal to each other.

But these were no mere sleight of hand illusions – as Ehrenborg points out, these intriguingly simple tricks all demonstrate valuable mathematical principles. These efforts are also

By Terrence Wade

(April 26, 2016) — The University of Kentucky Colleges of Arts and Sciences and Engineering are proud to have Nobel Prize Winner Frank Wilczek on campus this week as he delivers his lecture “Some Intersections of Art and Science.” The lecture will take place at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 28, at Memorial Hall. The event is free and open to the public.

The lecture will cover topics of profound reasons rooted in the nature of human cognition and perception and why art and science have a lot to offer one another. Wilczek will display some important historical examples of their synergy and point out some emerging opportunities. Several striking images will be an integral part of the presentation.

Wilczek is one of the world's

By Whitney Hale

This year's selection of a dozen UK students and alumni for NSF Graduate Research Fellowships is believed to be the largest in the school's history and is four times the number of selections for 2015. To put more of emphasis on the fellowship, 

By Deb Weis

(Feb. 19, 2016) – Creative and innovative University of Kentucky students from across campus will pitch their business concepts at the UK Venture Challenge Saturday, Feb. 20, at the UK Athletics Auditorium in William T. Young Library. The student teams are competing for $3,000 in scholarship prizes and the right to represent UK at the state competition, Idea State U.

The public is invited to attend the presentations, which will begin at 9 a.m. Feb. 20. Winners will be announced at 12:30 p.m.

There is even a way the public can be involved in the Venture Challenge. The most popular student venture, as decided by online voting, will receive a $50 prize. Voting closes at midnight Feb. 19, the night before the challenge begins.

“The annual UK Venture Challenge competition

By Jenny Wells

(Dec. 16, 2015) — The University of Kentucky bestowed its greatest honor — the awarding of an honorary degree — to UK alumnus Matt Cutts.  The 1995 graduate was recognized with an honorary doctorate of engineering during the Undergraduate Commencement Ceremony on Friday, Dec. 18.

Cutts has become well known as one of Google’s first 100 employees and has headed the company’s Webspam group since 2004. Cutts’ leadership has resulted in safer web searching for families and children, improved ranking schemes, and "search encryption."

A native of Morehead, Kentucky, Cutts was awarded a Singletary Scholarship to attend UK in 1990. He graduated with a double major in 1995, earning Bachelor of Science degrees in computer science and mathematics.

While at UK, Cutts achieved a sparkling academic record, maintaining a 4.0 GPA, receiving a Gaines

By Guy Spriggs

(Oct. 12, 2015) – Yitang Zhang - the mathematician who solved the bounded gap problem and spent many hours studying in University of Kentucky Libraries in the '90s - will deliver this year’s Hayden-Howard Lecture, hosted by the UK Department of Mathematics, at 4 p.m. on Thursday, October 15.

The event will take place in Room 110 of the White Hall Classroom Building.

The Hayden-Howard Lecture Series was established in 2001 to bring renowned research mathematicians to UK. The lecture was established by a friend of the Department of Mathematics and is named in honor of retired faculty

Math Movie of the Month (M^3) returns to campus with the showing of Counting from Infinity: Yitang Zhang and the Twin Prime Conjecture at 7:30pm on Friday, 18 September 2015 in White Hall Classroom Building, room 118. Yitang Zhang will be visiting the University of Kentucky in October to give the Hayden-Howard lecture.