Research visits and international collaboration

Faculty and graduate students traveled for research collaborations across Europe, Asia, and North America.

• Jacob Matherne visited the University of Bonn (Germany) to collaborate on building a framework for doing intuitive computations with certain modules associated to matroids.
• Ryan Murray visited Paris to work with collaborators on singularity formation and propagation in fluid dynamics.
• Yairon Cid Ruiz participated in a Collaborate@ICERM group (ICERM, Brown University, Providence).
• Semyon Tsynkov visited Tel Aviv University (Israel) to collaborate on high-order accurate numerical simulations of wave propagation phenomena.
• PhD student Jack Reever went to Vienna (Austria) to work with collaborators on a question linking discrete geometry and combinatorics.
• Erik Bates visited the University of Bristol (UK) to collaborate on permutation invariance in last-passage percolation and the distribution of the Busemann process.
• Khai T. Nguyen visited University of Roma Tor Vergata and University of Padova (Italy) to collaborate on Hamilton-Jacobi equations and hyperbolic conservation laws, and also visited International University (Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City) to collaborate on mathematical analysis, finance, and machine learning.
• Tye Lidman visited Washington University in St. Louis and Notre Dame University (Indiana) to work on three-dimensional manifolds.
• Lorena Bociu visited the University of Cantabria (Spain) to collaborate on optimal control problems.

Conferences, workshops, and invited speaking

• Ryan Murray participated in an Oberwolfach Workshop on Singularities in Discrete Systems and a workshop on Adversarial Machine Learning at Casa Matemática Oaxaca.
• Zane Li attended an Oberwolfach Workshop on Real Analysis, Harmonic Analysis, and Applications and two workshops at UPenn.
• Laura Colmenarejo participated in the 2025 Collaborative Workshop in Algebraic Combinatorics at IAS.
• David Papp was an invited speaker at the Lorentz Center workshop “Semidefinite programming: applications & solution methods.”
• Erik Bates gave a talk at a workshop on Stochastic Interacting Particle Systems and Random Matrices at the Rényi Institute.
• Andy Sageman-Furnas gave a minicourse at the MATRIX Institute (Creswick, Australia) on an analogous discrete surface theory.
• Khai T. Nguyen was an invited speaker at the Workshop on PDEs, Mathematical Physics, and Numerics (Texas A&M University) and at several universities in Vietnam.
• Semyon Tsynkov participated in ICOSAHOM (Montréal, Canada).
• Hangjie Ji participated in the MATRIX program on Slow Viscous Flows with Interfaces (Creswick, Australia).
• Stepan Paul participated in ICERM Illustrating Mathematics Reunion/Expansion.
• Lorena Bociu and Bevin Maultsby participated in a GEI Workshop at Université Côte d’Azur (UniCA) in Nice, France.
• Lorena Bociu and Madhumita Roy gave talks at the AWM Research Symposium (Madison, WI).

Plenary talks

• Ilse Ipsen
  • Householder Symposium XXII on Numerical Linear Algebra (Cornell University), June ’25
  • Second Conference on Random Matrix Theory and Numerical Linear Algebra (University of Washington), June ’25
• Peter McGrath
  • Geometry and Analysis Conference (Tsinghua University, Beijing, China)
  • Recent Developments in Geometric Analysis (University of Granada, Spain)
• Mette Olufsen
  • Biomath 2025
• Radmila Sazdanovic
  • Applied Topology in Poznań 2025 (Poznań, Poland), July ’25
  • Machine Learning and Mathematics (KIAS, Seoul), July ’25

Department participation at SIAM/CAIMS (Montréal, July 2025)

• Arvind Saibaba served as a co-chair of the 3rd Joint SIAM/CAIMS Annual Meeting and gave the closing remarks.
• In her role as Chair of the SIAG on Control and Systems Theory, Lorena Bociu ran the business meeting, introduced plenary speakers, and presented SIAG CST awards.
• Ala’ Alalabi gave a mini-tutorial on Partial Differential-Algebraic Equations: Dissipativity and Controller Design.
• Invited talks were given by Ala’ Alalabi, Lorena Bociu, Matthew Broussard, and Eva Ftaka.
• Department Head Alina Chertock attended (SIAM Board of Trustees).
• Additional attendees listed include Fatma Terzioglu, Ray Levy, Semyon Tsynkov, Mikhail Gilman, and Tim Kelley, along with many graduate students and postdocs.

Mathematical biology at ISMB

NC State had a major presence at the Annual Meeting of the International Society for Mathematical Biology in July 2025 in Edmonton, Alberta (Canada). The week-long meeting, with 800 participants from across the globe, included over 20 NC State faculty, current and former postdocs, and current and former students. Speakers included: Kevin Flores, Sharon Lubkin, and Mette Olufsen.  

Congratulations to Ph.D. student Louisa Ebby, who won a best poster award!

Undergraduate research and REUs

DRUMS REU (Summer 2025): 19 students across 6 groups. The program is jointly run by Mette Olufsen (Mathematics) and Brian Reich (Statistics).

• Groups were led by Mohammad Farazmand, Hangjie Ji, Mette Olufsen, and Arvind Saibaba, plus two groups from Statistics.
• Representative project titles: Inferring Global Sea Surface Temperatures from Sparse Measurements and Mathematical modeling of interfacial fluids.
• Math graduate student Louisa Ebby and postdoc Hugo Diaz were also involved.
• Alumni outcomes: one student received an NSF-GRFP; five DRUMS alumni were accepted to NC State graduate programs (2 Math, 2 Statistics, 1 CS).

Laura Colmenarejo worked with an NC State undergraduate student on combinatorial problems related to SEM polynomials.

Summer programs and training

Ray Levy organized a summer program at ICERM for beginning data science students with co-organizers from eight institutions. The group included 2 students and one TA from NC State.

New grants

Some of our Summer 2025 awards

• Lorena Bociu: NSF-DMS 2510261, Optimal Control in Multiscale Interface Couplings of Partial and Ordinary Differential Equations (Applied Mathematics), Sep 1, 2025 – Aug 31, 2028.
• Patrick Combettes: NSF-DMS 2513409, A Geometric Framework for Stochastic Algorithms in Feasibility and Inclusion Problems (Computational Mathematics), Jul 1, 2025 – Jun 30, 2028.
• Yairon Cid Ruiz: NSF-DMS 2502321, Multigraded structures in Algebra, Geometry, and Combinatorics, Sep 1, 2025 – Aug 31, 2027; Simons Foundation Travel Support.
• Ray Levy: NSF grant with the FDSA.
• Zane Li: NSF-DMS 2453448, Extensions and Applications of Fourier Decoupling Theory (Analysis), Aug 1, 2025 – Jul 31, 2028; Simons Foundation Travel Support.
• Tye Lidman: NSF-DMS 2506277, Four-manifolds, Dehn surgery, and Floer homology (Topology), Jul 15, 2025 – Jun 30, 2028; Simons Foundation Travel Support.
• Andrew Manion: NSF-DMS 2502205, Unifying TQFTs for gl(1,1) and the Alexander polynomial, Sep 1, 2025 – Aug 31, 2027.
• Jacob Matherne: NSF-DMS 2452179, Algebraic Invariants of Matroids and their Applications (Combinatorics), Aug 1, 2025 – Jul 31, 2028.
• Mette Olufsen: Computer Modeling and Image Processing to Assess the Impact of Aortic Reconstruction on Single Ventricle, Additional Ventures – Single Ventricle Fund (with Baylor College of Medicine and University of Houston).
• Stepan Paul: NSF-DUE 2439708, Advancing Multivariable and Vector Calculus Teaching with CalcPlot3D (IUSE), May 1, 2025 – Apr 30, 2028.
• Nathan Reading: Simons Foundation Travel Support for Mathematicians.
• Andy Sageman-Furnas: Simons-MATRIX travel grant.
• Teemu Saksala: NSF-DMS 2510272, Inverse Problems for Hyperbolic Partial Differential Operators (Applied Mathematics), Sep 1, 2025 – Aug 31, 2028.
• Yeonjong Shin: NSF-DMS 2513966, Effective Computational Methods for Training of Neural Networks (Computational Mathematics), Sep 1, 2025 – Aug 31, 2028.

Student awards, internships, and summer training

Congratulations to our fantastic students!

Awards

• Patrick Haughey: 2nd year NC Space Grant Fellowship; Belin Graduate Fellowship.
• Johnna Brooks: 2025 Steven Berkeley Marine Conservation Fellowship.
• James Kolesar: Belin Graduate Fellowship.
• Harley Hanes: Thunder Intern Award: Purpose-Driven, Sandia.

Internships

• Patrick Haughey: Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.
• Jack Reever: PDA: Healthcare Consulting (Raleigh).
• Harley Hanes: Sandia National Labs.

Summer schools and workshops

• Harshit Bhatt: ChAMELEON 25 Summer School (poster on low-rank and matrix-free Hessian compression for PDE-constrained inverse problems); SIAM Graduate Student Mathematical Modeling Camp and Mathematical Problems in Industry Workshop.
• Matthew Broussard and David Hernandez: EECI Summer School on Dissipativity and Optimal Control (Paris).
• Matthew Broussard: talks at the Mathematical Congress of the Americas (Miami) and SIAM Conference on Control and Its Applications (Montréal).
• Evangelia Ftaka: talk at SIAM Conference on Control and Its Applications (Montréal).
• Noah Lanier: Erdős Institute Quantum Computing Course.
• Christopher Portwood: Collaborative Projects in Algebraic Topology (Equivariant algebras and equivariant operads).

Recognition and milestones

• Andrea Hayes-Pennix graduated from the College Business Management Institute (SACUBO).
• Nick Mayers (former postdoc) started a new position as Assistant Professor of Mathematics at Kennesaw State University (GA). Nick works in algebraic combinatorics, representation theory, and Lie theory.
• Stepan Paul: artwork and interactives featured at the National Museum of Mathematics exhibit Warped Realities: The Art of Differential Geometry.

Welcome

New faculty, postdocs, and staff

• Nan Shen (Assistant Teaching Professor)
• Xiao Shen (Assistant Professor)
• Jordan Snyder (Assistant Teaching Professor)
• David Green (Postdoc)
• Lili Yan (Postdoc)
• Bethany Shea (Graduate Services Coordinator)
• Kim Turney (Accounting Technician)

New graduate students

MA Ph.D. Program:
Yinong Huang; Cullen Kurzenknabe; Justin Clarke Lasker; Elliott Love; Dengyao Luo; Jaxson Gehrig Mitchell; Austin Molitor; Emily Marie Riley; Noah Mahler Robertson; Andrew John Soma; Cristobal Luis Vivar (Vargas).

MA MS Program:
Juan Camilo Bonet; Aiden Zachary Chester; Felipe Bautista.

AMA Ph.D. Program:
Lauren Beuerle; Daniel Ferriter; Olivia Rigatti; Ryan Carl Rinaudo; Graham Rusco; Abhiram Vadlamani; Anzhelika Vasilyeva; David Yu Wu.

Go Pack!