A Look into Mathematical Biology

A Look into Mathematical Biology

Ever wonder how mathematics is used in biology? Professor Rebecca Everett uses differential equations to create mathematical models that represent biological systems. The models provide insight into these systems and predict long-term behavior.

Professor Everett (left) and her research students Maya Gong ‘23, Logan Post ‘23, and Anay Mehta ‘23 (left to right) presenting at Texas Tech University in 2021. The real world is full of complex biological relationships. A rabbit population might fluctuate depending on the fox population, the amount of edible plants, and the spread of disease. Mathematical biologists like Associate Professor of Mathematics and Statistics Rebecca Everett make sense of these relationships using mathematical models. She explains that the mathematical models she creates represent biological systems much like a model airplane represents a real airplane. They are not perfect copies...
The Traveling Salesperson Problem: In Search of Polynomial Time

The Traveling Salesperson Problem: In Search of Polynomial Time

The Traveling Salesperson Problem is one of the most famous open problems in computer science. What is it, and why is it so important?

GLPK solution of a traveling salesperson problem. Photo by Xpron. Public domain, via Wikimedia commons. Imagine you are planning a road trip. To save time and gas, you want to choose the shortest route that goes through all the cities you want to visit. How do you figure out what path to take? One option is the brute force approach — measuring and comparing the lengths of every possible route to find the shortest one. However, the number of possible paths grows very quickly as you add more destinations. With five cities to visit there are 24 possible routes, but...