Life at Fields
Fields-China Industrial
Problem Solving
Workshop in Finance
THE INDUSTRIAL PROBLEM Solving Workshops (IPSW),
organized through the Fields Commercial and Industrial
Mathematics Program (CIMP), are an opportunity to make
connections between academic and non-academic circles.
Academics learn about interesting, real-world research
problems and industries get access to some of the top
mathematical modellers and problem-solvers.
This year’s workshop was focused on challenges in finance
and included problems from The TMX Group, Scotiabank,
The China Futures Exchange, and the China Securities
Index Co., Ltd. After one week of working in small groups,
the participants presented their progress on each problem.
Fields Thesis
Competition
“The best part of the workshop is the cooperation,” said one
of the participating students.
The IPSW has a long-standing tradition—the Pacific Institute
for Mathematical Sciences (PIMS) started organizing such
events almost twenty years ago. Now the workshops are
organized jointly by the Fields Institute, the Centre de
Recherches Mathématiques in Montréal, PIMS, and the
Canadian Institute for Statistical Sciences (CANSSI).
Shige Peng, a Professor at China’s Shandong University
and one of Fields 2017 Research Fellows, thinks the IPSW
is “a wonderful opportunity, especially for our students.”
Mathematical tools are increasingly important in our
data-driven society. By creating connections between
mathematicians and industry, the CIMP hopes to support
technological advancement and innovation.
— Malgosia Ip
math, elliptic curves, L-functions, big
data, medical imaging, and more.
Judges Pierre Roquet from TEDxUofT,
Jean-Marie De Koninck from Université
ON APRIL 18TH, The Fields Institute
Laval, Arvind Gupta from the University
held its inaugural thesis competition
of Toronto and UBC, and Tom
in collaboration with TEDxUofT.
Salisbury of the Fields Institute and
Doctoral students studying any form
York University, had such a hard time
of mathematics from across Ontario
choosing the three winners that they
competed to see who could best present
added three honourable mentions.
their thesis topic within three minutes.
Though all the presentations were
The audience laughed and cheered as interesting, the judges felt that “the
winners were able to present complex
they heard presentations on financial
mathematical concepts in a particularly
engaging and accessible manner.”
Winners will have the opportunity to
expand their talks for a TEDxUofT salon
later this summer.
— Malgosia Ip
Winners
Grey Kuling,York University: How
Texture Will Change the Course of
Multiple Sclerosis
Thomas Bury, University of
Waterloo: Predicting Critical
Transitions in Nature and Society
Tyrone Ghaswala, University of
Waterloo: Pac-Man and Donuts
Honourable Mentions
Helen Cheyne, York University:
Improving Quantitative Credit
Estimates with Big Data
Anton Mosunov, University of
Waterloo: Theory of Elliptic Curves.
A History in Portraits.
Sawitree Boonpatcharanon, York
University: Digestion Data by
Clustering
8