About the Department of Math Sciences

Hosted in attractive, spacious and recently restructured Dunn Hall, and embedded in commercially vibrant and culturally rich great Memphis area, the Department of Mathematical Sciences offers outstanding opportunities for study and research in many areas of pure and applied mathematics and statistics.

The department's mission is multi-fold and encompasses strong components in education, research, and service. Its ultimate goal is the creation and dissemination of mathematics, to benefit the new generations, the scientific community at large, as well as, ultimately, the present technological society.

Mathematics plays an ever increasingly critical role in our global society, which requires analytical and quantitative analysis. In the present job market, job opportunities and careers are increasingly driven by mathematical thinking and quantitative skills. The department offers various degree programs at the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. level. Our graduate programs are characterized by breadth and depth in the following areas: combinatorics and graph theory; ergodic theory; functional analysis and operator theory; functional and partial differential equations and applied mathematics; mathematical learning theory and operations research; and applied statistics.

The department's faculty is actively involved in: (1) cutting-edge research in the above areas; (2) effective and dedicated education of the student population in small size sections; (3) close mentoring of Ph.D. students, domestic and international, aimed at preparing them for successful professional careers, both in academia and in the private or governmental sector; (4) service to the professional community and organizations through direct participation in scientific committees, editorial boards of math journals or book-series, and scientific panels. The math faculty is highly research productive in scholarly work, with several research projects being supported by external grants from the NSF, AFOSR, DARPA, etc.. The department organizes annually a number of conferences: the Erdős Conference in honor of Hungarian mathematician Paul Erdős who was a frequent annual visitor of the department; and the Differential Equation Weekend. Both are sponsored by the NSF. The department has hosted other major international conferences in Analysis, Combinatorics, Partial Differential Equations, and Statistics.

The department is a proud member of the Association for Women in Mathematics. AWM sponsors a wide variety of exciting programs that encourage girls and women to study mathematics and have active careers in mathematical sciences. 

The great Memphis area offers a superb professional program in the arts (blues, classical music, opera, theater, dance, etc.) to be complemented by the performances of the Music and Theater Departments of the University of Memphis; of other local colleges and universities; and religious and civic organizations.