Topics from the 8th Annual UNCG Regional Mathematics and Statistics Conference

The Annual University of North Carolina Greensboro Regional Mathematics and Statistics Conference (UNCG RMSC) has provided a venue for student researchers to share their work since 2005. The 8th Conference took place on November 3, 2012. The UNCG-RMSC conference established a tradition of attracting active researchers and their faculty mentors from NC and surrounding states. The conference is specifically tailored for students to present the results of their research and to allow participants to interact with and learn from each other. This type of engagement is truly unique. The broad scope of UNCG-RMSC includes topics in applied mathematics, number theory, biology, statistics, biostatistics and computer sciences.

Dr. Jan Rychtář is an associate professor of mathematics at the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at UNCG. He earned a Ph.D. in 2004 from the University of Alberta, and he joined the UNCG faculty the same year. He works in mathematical biology and game theory. With Mark Broom, he has co-authored a book ＂Game-theoretical models in biology＂, and authored or co-authored over 45 papers in peer-reviewed journals. Since 2005, he organizes an annual UNCG Regional Mathematics and Statistics Conference. He has supervised research of over 30 undergraduate students and has served as an Interim Director of the UNCG Office of Undergraduate Research in 2012-2013. He is a councilor for mathematics and computer sciences of the Council of Undergraduate Research.

Dr. Sat Gupta received PhD in mathematics from University of Delhi (1977) and PhD in statistics from Colorado State University (1987). He taught at University of Delhi for 6 years, at University of Southern Maine for 18 years, and has been at UNC Greensboro since 2004. He became a Full professor in 1997. His main research area is sampling designs, particularly designs needed for collecting information on sensitive topics where there is a greater likelihood of respondent evasiveness and untruthfulness. He has collaborated with researchers from many fields including biology, marine biology, education, anthropology, psychology, medicine, nursing, and computer science. Some of these collaborative works have been funded by NSF, NIH and other funding agencies. He is founding editor of the Journal of Statistical Theory and Practice (http: //www.tandfonline.com/loi/UJSP20) besides serving on the editorial boards of several other journals.

Dr. Ratnasingham Shivaji joined the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) as H. Barton Excellence Professor and Head of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics in July 2011. Prior to joining UNCG, he served for twenty-six years at Mississippi State University (MSU), where he was honored as a W.L. Giles Distinguished Professor. He received his Ph.D in Mathematics from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1981 and his B.S (first class honors) from the University of Sri Lanka in 1977. Shivaji’s area of specialization is partial differential equations, and in particular, nonlinear elliptic boundary value problems. His research work has applications in combustion theory, chemical reactor theory, and population dynamics, and has been funded by the National Science Foundation. To date, Shivaji has authored or coauthored one hundred and seventeen research papers, and served as thesis advisor for ten Ph.D. graduates.

Dr. Maya Chhetri is a professor of mathematics at the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at UNCG. She received her PhD from Mississippi State University in 1999 and joined UNCG the same year. She works in the area of differential equations and nonlinear analysis. In particular, her research interest is in the study of positive solutions of nonlinear boundary value problems, both ODEs and elliptic PDEs and their applications to other disciplines.