Department of Mathematics University of Kentucky   Lexington, KY 40506

Discrete Mathematics

2015-2016

Margaret Readdy is a plenary speaker for the FPSAC 2016 in Vancouver, Canada. This is the 28th International Conference on Formal Power Series and Algebraic Combinatorics. (July 2016)

2014-2015

Effective July 1, 2014 Benjamin Braun has been promoted to Associate Professor.

Graduate student Liam Solus was awarded an NSF EAPSI fellowship in support of a 10-week visit to Osaka University in Summer 2014, where he will be working with Takayuki Hibi.

Benjamin Braun is an invited speaker at the August 2014 Fields Institute workshop "On Making Models: Stimulating Research In Rigidity Theory And Spatial-Visual Reasoning."

Benjamin Braun is the founding Editor-in-Chief of the American Mathematical Society blog "On Teaching and Learning Mathematics."

Benjamin Braun has been appointed as a member-at-large on the American Mathematical Society Committee on Education from 2014 to 2017.

Benjamin Braun is the invited leader for a workshop on using writing in first-year STEM courses at Texas A&M International University in September 2014

Margaret Readdy gave a talk in the University of Pennsylvania Combinatorics and Algebraic Geometry seminar in September 2014.

Carl Lee gave the lecture, "Stillness in Motion: The Essence of Symmetry" as part of the 2014--15 Chellgren Seminar Series at the University of Kentucky.

Richard Ehrenborg is a one-hour invited speaker at the Fall 2014 Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics in October 2014 at High Point, NC.

Richard Ehrenborg is a one-hour invited speaker at the Clemson Mini-Conference in Discrete Mathematics in October 2014.

Graduate student Robert Davis in an invited speaker at the 2014 Fall Western Section Meeting of the American Mathematical Society in San Francisco in the special session on polyhedral number theory.

Margaret Readdy is a one-hour invited speaker at the 28th Midwest Conference on Combinatorics, Cryptography and Computing (MCCCC), University of Nevada, Las Vegas in October 2014.

Benjamin Braun is an invited speaker at the November 2014 IMA workshop on Geometric and Enumerative Combinatorics.

Richard Ehrenborg is an invited speaker for the Michelle Wachs Conference in January 2015 at the University of Miami.

Margaret Readdy is an invited speaker for the Michelle Wachs Conference in January 2015 at the University of Miami.

Benjamin Braun is an invited speaker at the March 2015 Spring Northeastern Section Meeting of the American Mathematical Society, in the special session on convexity and combinatorics

Richard Ehrenborg is an invited speaker for the 2015 Midwest Combinatorics Conference in May 2015 at the University of Minnesota.

Benjamin Braun is an invited speaker at the May 2015 Midwest Combinatorics Conference at the University of Minnesota.

2013-2014

Graduate student Robert Davis was awarded a Fulbright Graduate Research Fellowship to spend 2013-2014 at Aalto University in Helsinki, Finland, working with Alex Engstrom.

Carl Lee is a recipient of the Deborah and Franklin Tepper Haimo Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching of Mathematics. His award will be presented in January 2014 during the Joint Mathematics Meetings in Baltimore, MD.

Richard Ehrenborg is an invited speaker at CGames 2013 USA -- 18th International Conference on Computer Games in Louisville, Kentucky in August 2013. He is speaking about joint work with Chris Skinner (Princeton U) on the Blind Bartender Problem.

Ben Braun, Carl Lee and David Royster are organizing the special session "The Work of Mathematicians and Mathematics Departments in Mathematics Education" in the Fall Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS at the University of Louisville in October 2013.

Ben Braun is speaking in the "Topological Combinatorics" special session at the Fall 2013 AMS Sectional Meeting in Saint Louis, MO.

Richard Ehrenborg is speaking on "Manifold Arrangements" in the Topological Combinatorics special session at the Fall 2013 AMS Sectional Meeting in Saint Louis, MO.

Margaret Readdy will be visiting Binghamton University and giving a talk in their Combinatorics Seminar in October 2013.

Ben Braun is speaking in the mathematics department colloquium at Denison University in November 2013.

Carl Lee and Ben Braun are organizing the special session "Geometric and Algebraic Combinatorics" at the Spring Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS at the University of Tennessee in March 2014. Speakers included Richard Ehrenborg, former visiting assistant professor Edwin O'Shea, and graduate students Yue Cai, Brad Fox and Cliff Taylor.

Margaret Readdy is giving an invited talk as part Bijective and Algebraic Combinatorics, a conference in honor of Bruce Sagan's 60th birthday at the University of Florida in March 2014. Readdy was the second PhD student of Sagan.

Ben Braun is speaking in the mathematics department colloquium at Oberlin College in April 2014.

2012-2013

Benjamin Braun will be speaking in the Special Session on "Toric Algebraic Geometry and Beyond" at the AMS Central Sectional Meeting in October 2012.

Benjamin Braun will be speaking in the Special Session on "Algebraic and Topological Combinatorics" at the AMS Southeastern Sectional Meeting in October 2012.

Richard Ehrenborg will be visiting MIT and giving a talk in the MIT Combinatorics Seminar in late October 2012.

Margaret Readdy will be visiting MIT and giving an invited lecture in the D.W. Weeks Lecture Series in early November 2012.

Margaret Readdy will be visiting the University of Minnesota and giving a talk in January 2013.

Margaret Readdy is an invited speaker in the AMS special session "Algebraic Combinatorics" as part of the 2013 Spring Southeastern Sectional Meeting in March 2013.

Michelle Wachs of the University of Miami will be giving the University of Kentucky 2012-13 Hayden Howard Lecture. Previous speakers include Carlos Kenig, David Eisenbud, Richard Stanley, Gang Tian and Doron Zeilberger

Margaret Readdy is an Invited Lecturer (4 lectures) for the 2013 Program for Woman and Mathematics sponsored by the Institute for Advanced Study and Princeton University.

In June 2013 Margaret Readdy will be giving the talk "Euler flag enumeration and Whitney stratified spaces" at the 11th Nordic Combinatorial Conference (NORCOM2013) in Stockholm, Sweden.

In June 2013 Richard Ehrenborg will be giving the talk "Manifold arrangements and shelling components" at the 11th Nordic Combinatorial Conference (NORCOM2013) in Stockholm, Sweden.

In June 2013 Richard Ehrenborg will be giving the talk "Euler flag enumeration of Whitney stratified spaces" at the FPSAC 2013 Conference in Paris, France.

2011-2012

Effective July 1, 2011, Margaret Readdy has been promoted to Full Professor.

Benjamin Braun is organizing the Invited Paper Session "Polyhedra are everywhere!" at the MathFest 2011 being held in Lexington, KY in August 2011. Speakers include Carl Lee and Margaret Readdy .

Benjamin Braun will be giving a talk at the SIAM Conference on Applied Algebraic Geometry in Raleigh, NC in October 2011.

Richard Ehrenborg gave the talk "Euler flag enumeration of Whitney stratified spaces" in the Workshop on Symmetry in Graphs, Maps and Polytopes at the Fields Institute in October 2011.

Benjamin Braun will be presenting a poster at the ERC Workshop "High-Complexity Discrete Geometry" at FU Berlin in October 2011.

Margaret Readdy gave a talk at Cornell University in the Discrete Geometry and Combinatorics Seminar and visited Louis Billera in November 2011.

Richard Ehrenborg and Margaret Readdy will be giving invited talks in the Special Session on Combinatorial Geometry of Polytopes being organized by Egon Schulte (Northeastern) and Asia Ivic Weiss (York University) as part of the at the January 2012 Joint Mathematics Meetings in Boston, MA.

Benjamin Braun and Drew Armstrong are organizing a special session on "Combinatorics: Algebraic and Geometric" at the 2012 AMS Spring Southeastern Section Meeting.

Undergraduate Jenna Noll gave a talk at the National Conference on Undergraduate Research at Weber State University in Utah in March 2012 based upon summer research conducted with B. Braun in Summer 2011.

Richard Ehrenborg gave a seminar talk at George Washington University in March 2012.

Margaret Readdy gave a colloquium talk at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (April 2012).

Benjamin Braun and Carl Lee are giving talks in Kyoto, Japan at the Workshop on Convex Polytopes.

2010-2011

Richard Ehrenborg has been awarded a one year Membership at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton during the academic year 2010--2011.

Margaret Readdy has been awarded a one year Membership at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton during the academic year 2010--2011.

Richard Ehrenborg will be giving a talk in the University of Pennsylvania Combinatorics and Algebraic Geometry (CAGE) seminar in mid-October.

Margaret Readdy will be giving a talk in the University of Pennsylvania Combinatorics and Algebraic Geometry (CAGE) seminar in late October.

Benjamin Braun will be speaking in the special session, "Algebraic and Topological Combinatorics" at the 2010 Fall Central Section Meeting of the AMS November 5--7 at Notre Dame.

Carl Lee has been invited to participate in the BIRS conference, Topological methods in Toric Geometry, Symplectic Geometry and Combinatorics in November 2010.

Richard Ehrenborg and Margaret Readdy will be attending the BIRS workshop Quasisymmetric Functions in November 2010. Louis Billera, Sara Billey and Richard Stanley are organizing this workshop.

Margaret Readdy will be giving a talk in the Rutgers Experimental Mathematical Seminar in December 2010.

Richard Ehrenborg will be giving a talk in the Rutgers Experimental Mathematical Seminar in February 2011.

Richard Ehrenborg will be giving a talk in the at LACIM (Laboratoire de combinatoire et d'informatique mathematique) in Montreal in March 2011.

Drew Armstrong and Ben Braun are organizing an AMS special session at the Southeastern Sectional Meeting in March 2011.

Margaret Readdy has been invited to participate as a senior faculty member at the May 2011 BIRS workshop Algebraic Combinatorixx. This is a collaborative research and mentoring workshop for female combinatorialists being organized by Georgia Benkart, Monica Vazirani and Stephanie van Willigenburg.

Richard Ehenborg is a one hour invited speaker for the FPSAC 2011 in Reykjavik, Iceland. This is the 23rd International Conference on Formal Power Series and Algebraic Combinatorics.

2009-2010 and before

See archived discrete news.

• Discrete CATS Seminar (formerly the Algebraic Combinatorics Seminar). Organizer: Margaret Readdy.

• WILDCATS Seminar. Organizer: Margaret Readdy.

• Computer Science Colloquium.

• University of Louisville Algebra & Combinatorics Seminar. Information: Jake Wildstrom.
  
  

2015

• Conference in honor of Michelle Wachs, University of Miami, Miami, FL. (January 5--9, 2015)

2014

• Spring Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN. (March 21--23, 2014)
  • Special Session on Geometric and Algebraic Combinatorics organized by Benjamin Braun and Carl Lee.

• Bijective and Algebraic Combinatorics, a conference in honor of Bruce Sagan's 60th birthday, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL. (March 24--25, 2014)
• 27th Annual Cumberland Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing, West Virginia University (May 16--17, 2014)

• ALGECOM: Algebra, Geometry and Combinatorics Day U Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. (May 24, 2014)

• Stanley@70, a conference in honor of Richard P. Stanley's 70th birthday, MIT, Boston, MA. (June 23--27, 2014)

• FPSAC'14, DePaul University, Chicago, IL. (June 30 -- July 3, 2014)

• Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics (TLC), High Point University, High Point, NC. (October 4, 2014)

  2013

• 2013 Joint Mathematics Meetings, San Diego, CA. (January 9--12, 2013)
  • Special Session on Algebraic Combinatorics and Representation Theory
  • Special Session on Discrete Geometry and Algebraic Combinatorics
  • Special Session on Discrete and Computational Geometry
  • Special Session on Patterns in Permutations and Words
  • Special Session on Topological Combinatorics
  • Special Session on Tropical Geometry

• Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics (TLC), Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC. (February 9, 2013)

• Spring Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS, University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS. (March 1--3, 2013)
  • Special Session on Algebraic Combinatorics

• Combinatorics and Graph Theory 2013, Program for Women and Mathematics, Institute for Advanced Study and Princeton University, Princeton, NJ. (May 13--24, 2013)

  26th Cumberland Conference on combinatorics, Graph theory & Computing, Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro, TN. (May 24--26, 2013)

• Nordic Combinatorial Conference (NORCOM 2013), Stockholm, SWEDEN. (June 17 -- 19, 2013)

• FPSAC'13, Universite Paris-7, Paris, FRANCE. (June 24 -- 28, 2013)

• Permutation Patterns'13, Universite Paris-7, Paris, FRANCE. (July 1 -- 5, 2013)

• Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics (TLC), NC State, Raleigh, NC. (September 21, 2013). George Andrews will be giving a colloquium on September 20th.

  2012

• 2012 Joint Mathematics Meetings, Boston, MA. (January 4--7, 2012)
  • Special Session on Combinatorial Geometry of Polytopes

• Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics (TLC), Duke University, Durham, NC. (February 11, 2012)

• Spring Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL. (March 10--11, 2012)
  • Special Session on Combinatorics: Algebraic & Geometric

• 8th Graduate Student Combinatorics Conference University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL (April 13--15, 2012)

• CombinaTexas 2012, Southwestern University (April 21--22, 2012)

• 25th Annual Cumberland Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing, East Tennessee State University (May 10--12, 2012)

• SIAM Conference on Discrete Mathematics, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, CANADA (June 18--21, 2012)

• Workshop on Convex Polytopes Kyoto, JAPAN. (July 23 -- July 27, 2012)

• FPSAC'12, Nagoya University, Nagoya, JAPAN. (July 30 -- August 3, 2012)

• Triangle Lectures in Combinatorics (TLC), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC (September 22, 2012)

• Fall Southeastern Section Meeting of the AMS, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA. (October 13--14, 2012)
  • Special Session on Algebraic Combinatorics: Rook Theory and Applications
  • Special Session on Algebraic and Topological Combinatorics

• Fall Central Section Meeting of the AMS, University of Akron, Akron, OH.Tampa, FL. (October 20--21, 2012)
  
  

From July 2013 through June 2015, Richard Ehrenborg is partially supported by a National Security Agency grant. In summer 2014 his grant is supporting Discrete graduate students Brad Fox, Alex Happ and Dustin Hedmark. In summer 2013 his grant supported Discrete graduate students Brad Fox and Yue Cai.

From May 2013 through April 2015, Benjamin Braun is partially supported by a National Security Agency Young Investigators Award.

Benjamin Braun, together with Matthias Beck, Thomas Bliem, Matthias Koeppe, Peter Paule, and Carla Savage, have been awarded funding from the American Institute of Mathematics for a SQuaRE (Structured Quartet Research Ensembles) on "Partition Theory and Polyhedral Geometry."

Margaret Readdy has been awarded a five year Simons Foundation Collaboration grant (July 2011 - June 2016).

Margaret Readdy has been awarded a University of Kentucky Tenured Professor Fellowship to support her research and the writing of a research monograph during Spring 2011.

Margaret Readdy is the PI and Richard Ehrenborg is the CoPI for National Science Foundation grant DMS-1024407 to support participants at the workshop "Combinatorics 2010: Advances, Trends & Speculations (CATS 2010 Workshop)".

From July 2009 through June 2013, Richard Ehrenborg is being partially supported by the National Science Foundation via award DMS-0902063. This grant is also supporting summer research by his students Eric Clark, JiYoon Jung and Brad Fox .

Margaret Readdy is the PI for National Science Foundation grant DMS-0913073 to support participants of the 2009 Graduate Student Combinatorics Conference.

From July 2008 through June 2010, Benjamin Braun is partially supported by the National Science Foundation via award DMS-0758321.

The Institute for Mathematics and its Applications (IMA) has funded Margaret Readdy's proposal for the 2009 Graduate Student Combinatorics Conference.

Benjamin Braun has received MSRI funding to participate in the January 2008 MSRI workshop "Introductory Workshop in Combinatorial Representation Theory".

Richard Ehrenborg is the Principle Investigator for a National Security Agency Grant (June 2006 - May 2009). His grant is currently supporting summer research by Eric Clark and Michael Slone.

Carl Lee is a Co-PI for ACCLAIM (Appalachian Collaborative Center for Learning, Assessment and Instruction in Mathematics), National Science Foundation grant ESI-0119679 (5 years beginning September 2001; $10,543,250). See www.acclaim-math.org. He is also a Co-PI for AMSP (Appalachian Mathematics Science Partnership), National Science Foundation (5 years beginning October 2002; $22,263,868). See www.appalmsp.org.

Carlos Nicolas , Terry Contenza and Laura Schmidt received partial support to attend the workshop, "Discrete and Computational Geometry: Twenty Years Later", Snowbird, Utah, June 18-22, 2006.

The NSF and BIRS supported Richard Ehrenborg's and Carl Lee's March 2006 research visits to the Banff International Research Station.

The NSF and Mittag Leffler Institute supported Richard Ehrenborg's and Margaret Readdy's March 2005 research visits to the Mittag Leffler Institute.

During the academic year 2004-2005, graduate student Michael Slone was selected to be a University of Kentucky Presidential Scholar. This support, along with NSF funding, enabled him to spend the Spring 2005 semester at the Mittag-Leffler Institute for their special semester in Algebraic Combinatorics.

The NSF and BIRS supported Richard Ehrenborg's and Margaret Readdy's August 2004 research visits to the Banff International Research Station.

The NSF and the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton supported Richard Ehrenborg's and Margaret Readdy's July 2004 research visits to the IAS/Park City Mathematics Institute.

During the summer 2004 Richard Ehrenborg was partially funded by a University of Kentucky Summer Faculty Research Fellowship.

During the summer 2004 Margaret Readdy was partially funded by a Research Activity Award Grant sponsored by the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky

• MA 514 - Combinatorial Structures and Techniques
  C. Lee.
  
• MA 714 - Discrete Morse Theory (Topics in Discrete Mathematics)
  B. Braun.
  

Spring 2014 Graduate Courses:

• MA 614 - Enumerative Combinatorics
  M. Readdy.
  
• MA 714 - Topics in Discrete Mathematics (Unimodal sequences)
  B. Braun.
  

Undergraduate Courses:

• MA 415 - Graph Theory and Combinatorics (Fall)
  R. Ehrenborg
• MA/CS 340 - Applicable Algebra; (Discrete Structures in CS) (Spring)
  R. Ehrenborg, M. Readdy.
  

Sample Qualifying Coursework for Doctoral Students:

MA 514	-	Combinatorial Structures and Techniques
MA 515	-	Linear and Combinatorial Optimization
MA 614	-	Enumerative Combinatorics
MA 714	-	Combinatorics of Coxeter Groups
MA 714	-	Geometric Combinatorics
MA 714	-	Geometric Probability
MA 715	-	Commutative Algebra and Polytopes
MA 715	-	Graph Theory
MA 715	-	Hyperplane Arrangements
MA 715	-	Matroid Theory
MA 715	-	Polytope Theory
MA 715	-	Representation Theory and the Symmetric Group
CS 575	-	Theoretical Aspects of Computing

Former Doctoral Students:

• JiYoon Jung. Three-year Postdoc, Marshall University, Huntington, WV, Ph.D. 2012, "The topology of restricted partition posets and descent pattern avoidance," R. Ehrenborg.

• Eric Clark. Assistant Professor, Western New England University, Springfield, MA, Ph.D. 2011, "Combinatorial aspects of excedances and the Frobenius complex," R. Ehrenborg.
• Matt Zeckner. Assistant Professor, Adrian College, Adrian, MI, Ph.D. 2011, "Topological and combinatorial properties of neighborhood and chessboard complexes," B. Braun.

• DJ Wells. Mathematics Teacher, Kingston High School, Kingston, NC, Ph.D. 2010, "General flips and the cd-index," C. Lee.

• Patricia Muldoon Brown. Assistant Professor, Armstrong Atlantic State University, Ph.D. 2009, "Rees products of posets and inequalities," M. Readdy.

• Carlos Nicolás. Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Ph.D. 2008, "Structural and enumerative properties of k-triangulations of the n-gon," C. Lee.
• Michael Slone. Programmer, University of Kentucky Libraries, Ph.D. 2008, "Homological combinatorics and extensions of the cd-index," R. Ehrenborg.

• Gareth Bendall. Visiting Assistant Professor, Georgetown College Ph.D. 2004, "Domination Analysis Beyond the Traveling Salesman Problem," F. Margot/C. Lee.
• Matt Menzel. Assistant Professor, Marietta College, OH; Ph.D. 2004, "Generalized Sewing Constructions for Polytopes," C. Lee.

• Robert Riehemann. Instructor, Northern Kentucky University; Ph.D. 2003, "Subset Take-away on Graphs," C. Lee.
• Jakayla Robbins. Assistant Professor, University of Montana; Currently Senior Lecturer & Assist. Director of Undergraduate Studies at Vanderbilt University; Ph.D. 2003, "Orientations of Free Spikes," C. Lee.
• Laura Schmidt. Assistant Professor, University of Wisconsin -- Stout; Ph.D. 2003, "Numbers of faces of simplicial spheres & balls," C. Lee.

• Connie Gerads Fournelle. Alphatech, Inc., Burlington, MA; Ph.D. 2000, "Covering Units of Aperiodic Tilings," C. Lee.
• Teresa Contenza. Assistant Professor, University of Montevallo, AL; Ph.D. 2000, "On the Dominating-Set Polytope," C. Lee.
• Cynthia Aossey. Frankfort; Ph.D. 2000, "3PC(.,.)-Free Berge Graphs are Perfect," K. Vuskovic / C. Lee.

• Daphne Skipper. US WEST Advanced Technologies; Ph.D. 1999, "Combinatorial Scheduling Models," J. Lee.
• Wendy Weber. Assistant Professor, Central College; Ph.D. 1999, "Recovering Triangulations of Convex Polytopes," C. Lee.
• John Kuchenbrod. MITRE Corp., McLean, VA; Ph.D., 1999, "Extremal Problems on Weighted Graphs," J. Lee.

• Joy D. Williams Lind. Level 3 Communications; Ph.D., 1998, "Spectral Bounds for Entropy Models," J. Lee.
• Dan Wilson. US WEST Advanced Technologies; Ph.D., 1998, "Polyhedral Methods for Piecewise-Linear Functions," J. Lee.

• Matt Scobee. Humana; Ph.D., 1997, "Orientations of Ternary Matroids," J. Lee.
• Robert Hebble. Assistant Professor, Kentucky State University; Ph.D., 1997, "Hamiltonicity of Squeezed Spheres," C. Lee.

• Stewart Tung. Assistant Professor, Dallas Baptist University; Ph.D., 1996, "Monge, Optimality, and Feasibility Sequences in Capacitated Transportation Problems," C. Lee.

• Fariba Bigdeli-Jahed. Associate Professor, Kentucky State University; Ph.D., 1991, "Regular Triangulations of Convex Polytopes and d-Cubes," C. Lee.

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