Return to Ravenel's home page .
Current and future courses:
Midnight breakfast study session in 1996.
The student standing behind me
is now a hotshot theoretical physicist.Office hours online by appointment, Zoom link.
Links to previous courses
Pages and links for undergraduate math topics:
- Archimedes Biography Page
- Archimedes Palimpsest Page The 1997 discovery of a long lost mathematical manuscript that reveals Archimedes' use of calculus.
- The Best Careers for Math Majors in 2018 What Can You Really do with a Math Degree?
- Biographies of mathematicians
Life stories of hundreds of mathematicians across the centuries.
Click on "Full Mac Tutor biography" after finding the person you want.
- Fermat's Last Theorem A centuries old problem that was finally solved in 1995.
- The Gabriel's horn paradox Gabriel's Horn (also called Torricelli's trumpet) is a figure invented by Evangelista Torricelli which has infinite surface area, but finite volume. This is explained in Math 162.
- Galois page The tragic story of the mathematician whose visionary work is the subject of a course (Math 237) taught in every major university and who was killed in a duel at the age of 20.
- Gauss page His mathematical abilities and exploits caused his contemporaries to dub him princeps, and biographers customarily place him on a par with Archimedes and Newton.
- Sophie Germain The 18th-century woman who assumed a man's identity in order to pursue her passion for mathematics.
- Benoit Mandelbrot The father of fractal geometry.
- The Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search How you can use your computer to discover the largest known prime number.
- Mathematical Aphrodisiac You have to try this.
- Origami constructions Learn how to trisect an angle by folding paper, something that cannot be done with ruler and compass.
- Quintic equations page It is known that there is no formula for the general solution to a polynomial equation of degree 5 or higher. This is a consequence of the famous theorem of Galois, which is taught in Math 237.
- Ramanujan page Read about the self trained Indian mathematical genius who dazzled Cambridge mathematicians in 1913.
- Research Experience for Undergraduates A big list of summer programs maintained by the American Mathematical Society.
- Ruler and Compass Classical Greek geometry.
- Alan Turing page The father of computer science and war hero who was prosecuted for being gay.
- Wallpaper groups This topic is extensively documented on the web perhaps because of its great visual appeal.
- Why are there so many primes numbers? Slides for a talk given to SUMS on October 15, 2008. Alternate version with white background.
- Zeno's Paradox Page Calculus provides the solution to a 2000 year old riddle.
Previous courses:
Math 549 and 550 Special topics in algebraic topology
- Spring 2021, Category theory for the masses
- Spring 2018, Spectral Sequences
- Spring 2016, Equivariant stable homotopy theory and the Kervaire invariant
- Spring 2015, Foundations of Stable Homotopy Theory
- Fall 2012, Equivariant Stable Homotopy Theory
- Spring 2010, A Solution to the Arf-Kervaire Invariant Problem
- Spring 2007, Algebraic Curves in Stable Homotopy Theory
- Fall 2003, Elliptic Cohomology
- Fall 2001, Model categories
Math 443 Algebraic topology
Fall 2022 Fall 2021 Fall 2020 Fall 2019 Fall 2017 Fall 2016 Fall 2015 Fall 2014 Spring 2014 Spring 2013 Spring 2012 Spring 2011 Spring 2008 Spring 2006 Spring 2005 Spring 2004 Spring 2003 Math 240H Honors Topology Honors
Spring 2020 Spring 2019 Math 236H Introduction to Algebra I Honors version
Spring 2017 Spring 2012 Spring 2010
Spring 2008 Spring 2006Math 237 Introduction to Algebra II
Fall 2017 Fall 2013 Fall 2012 Fall 2010 Fall 2008 Fall 2006 Math 215 Fractals and computer graphics Spring 1998
Math 165 Linear algebra with differential equations
Fall 2004 Spring 1999 Math 162 Calculus IIA
Fall 2022 Fall 2020 Fall 2019 Spring 2019 Fall 2016 Fall 2015 Fall 2014 Fall 2013 Fall 2011 Fall 2010 Fall 2009 Fall 2007 Spring 2007 Math 142 Calculus II Spring 2001
Math 141 Calculus I Fall 2000