April 13, 2023 11:00 am
Sperner’s Lemma and Cake-Cutting: Old and New
2023 Gentry Lecturer
Francis Edward Su, Benediktsson-Karwa Professor of Mathematics, Harvey Mudd College
April 13, 2023, 11:00 am
016 Manchester Hall
Sperner’s Lemma and Cake-Cutting: Old and New: How do you divide a cake (or other things) fairly? This is a classical question, of interest to mathematicians, economists, and political scientists. In this talk, I’ll explain how a combinatorial result known as Sperner’s lemma can answer this question. We’ll also discuss recent generalizations of Sperner’s lemma that have implications for cake-cutting.
Bio: Francis Edward Su is the Benediktsson-Karwa Professor of Mathematics at Harvey Mudd College and a former president of the Mathematical Association of America. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University. His research is in geometric combinatorics and applications to the social sciences and he has co-authored numerous papers with undergraduates. He also has a passion for teaching and popularizing mathematics. From the Mathematical Association of America, he received the 2013 Haimo Award for distinguished teaching and the 2018 Halmos-Ford Award for his writing. His work has been featured in Quanta Magazine, Wired, and The New York Times. His book Mathematics for Human Flourishing (Yale University Press, 2020) won the 2021 Euler Book Prize. It is an inclusive vision of what math is, who it’s for, and why anyone should learn it.