Her parents met when her father left Nigeria to study mathematics at the same college in England where her mother was studying physics. Her father, the Nigerian George Okikiolu , has written more mathematics papers than any other Black mathematician.
She is married to mathematican Hans Lindblad. Okikiolu earned her B. There, she worked with two mentors, Sun-Yung Alice Chang and John Garnett, and was able to solve a problem concerning asymptotics of determinants of Toeplitz operators on the sphere and a conjecture of Peter Jones, characterizing subsets of rectifiable curves in Euclidean n-space. She earned her Ph. After her doctorate, Kate went, in , to Princeton University where she was an Instructor and an Assistant Professor until She became a resident status in the U.
Also in , Dr. Okikiolu ha ricevuto un B. Nel ha conseguito il dottorato di ricerca. Carriera Sulla base del suo lavoro di dottorato, Okikiolu ha risolto una congettura di Peter Wilcox Jones riguardante una versione continua del problema del commesso viaggiatore, nel suo articolo Caratterizzazione di sottoinsiemi di curve rettificabili in Rn. Ha anche tenuto la conferenza Claytor-Woodard al meeting del della National Association of Mathematicians, un'organizzazione per i matematici afroamericani.
A famous question in the field is, can one hear the shape of a drum? Spectral geometry bridges different branches of science, including engineering and physics, as well as a number of different fields of mathematics. However, quite different sorts of questions are studied within each discipline. I am a mathematical analyst, which gives me an appreciation for the infinite and the infinitesimal. At the moment, one of the things I am working on understanding is the total wavelength of a surface like a sphere or something of greater complexity, such as the surface of a bagel or a pretzel.
What is this total wavelength? If you strike a surface it can resonate at any one of a list of frequencies, and the wavelength of the sound produced by the vibration is inversely proportional to the frequency. In the mathematically idealized model there are infinitely many possible wavelengths.
The total wavelength should be the sum of all of these individual wavelengths except that this infinite sum equals infinity. Fortunately, a finite number can be assigned to it by a slightly elusive process called regularization.
This process is also used in mathematical physics to mysteriously obtain true answers from formulas which do not really make sense! I first became interested in the total wavelength as a model related to a question which can be roughly stated as, can one hear the shape of the universe? However, the total wavelength shows up in many quite different areas of mathematics and I am finding these connections intriguing. Okikiolu joined the faculty at the University of California at San Diego in where she became an associate professor.
The Abstract was as follows:- The research supported in this award lies in the general area of geometric analysis. More specifically, the investigator is to study properties of the determinant of the Laplacian on closed compact Riemannian manifolds under all smooth perturbations in the metric which leave the total volume fixed. This may have implications for the Poincare conjecture. In addition, the investigator is to consider the wave operator on general negatively curved manifolds in connection with quantum chaos theory.
For example, the investigator of this award intends to run summer workshops for students introducing them to various current problems in geometric analysis using numerical methods. Also, she is to help develop inner-city K- 12 mathematics and science curricula by producing a series of videos depicting model lessons for the inner-city classroom. The lessons will involve design and construction activities which lead directly to the study of mathematics, and incorporate elements from minority social cultures.
During the years that this project was running, Okikiolu spent two further periods at the Institute for Advanced Study, from September to December and from September to December She gave three talks at the University of Pennsylvania on 24 March , 3 October and 14 March As well as giving her affiliation as the University of California at San Diego, it is also indicated that she is affiliated to the University of Pennsylvania. And he got his start in Lakewood. As his career took off and he made a name for himself, Cray did so with his high school friend and bass player Richard Cousins at his side.
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