From 443cc87d0d5cc97404b53856f6e19c308f23cd8d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: kammitama5 Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2024 22:11:35 -0700 Subject: [PATCH] Create 2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md --- _posts/2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md | 105 ++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 105 insertions(+) create mode 100644 _posts/2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md diff --git a/_posts/2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md b/_posts/2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..4de0e2ed6f7aa --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2024-04-23-Tuesday-April-23rd.md @@ -0,0 +1,105 @@ +## USTARS and IOWA CITY + +## It is super early +- I'm actually writing this after working on a paper submission, just before heading to sleep. It's been a week! +- I just got back from presenting a paper at USTARS, which is the Underrepresented Students in Topology and Algebra Research +Symposium. It's my first time, it was in Iowa City, and I have to say it was AMAZING! You really felt pretty close with +everyone by the end of the Symposium. Also, my labmate Jeremy gave a Distinguished talk, which was awesome! We were both +plotting about whether or not we would make it this year, and I was convinced! +- On the last day, I ended up carpooling back with a shuttle of Californians (naturally). We plotted to have the next USTARS +in Oregon (nope; the next one is in Colgate U or Georgia). +- Anyways, so about Iowa City; the people are super friendly, the food I had was amazing, and I just had a great time. +There is so much to do, too! After the first day of the Symposium, people went to a bar, some others went to a house party, +and this was after a full day of talks and posters and a dinner afterwards, too! My friend and I (since she goes there) +ended up hanging out at her apartment and watching the movie Elemental, which I hadn't seen before. I just had a great time. +- There were so many people who were just amazing (including my roommate, who is a total bad@$$ and not only got the NSF award, +is mentored by two amazing profs but also happens to have Caribbean parents!) and it was just the most wonderful, thoughtful +space. I will upload all the photos I took for the organizers; I promise! +- Oh, we also took a group photo, as is customary! +- Interestingly, my friend at CMU had told me that they went to undergrad in Iowa, and it was a good time. So they had hoped +I would like it, and I definitely did! I loved it! I kid you not; by the first afternoon I had found boba and fish balls and +was having a pretty tough time deciding what to eat considering I really only had to eat one meal. And everyone was just +super friendly and I made friends with a corgi! +I even went to a prospective students Open House day that happened to be going on +when I arrived, and I pretended to be everything from a Theatre Arts student, to a Physics student, until I hung out at the +Maths table. +- The theme this year seemed to have some quantum-ness to it, so some talks on Hopf algebras, quantum algebras, Bosonization +but also some talks on more classical Graph Theory topics involving colorings and that sort of thing. And of course, on +the Algebra side, one of the Faculty distinguished talks was on the ABC Conjecture and my friend (yes, the one who I hung out +with to watch Elemental) gave a talk on Holomorphic Differentials to a pretty full room! +- I was surprised that there was a lot of interest in my poster, which I was sort of arguing about with Jeremy a while ago, +because I wasn't sure that I was a fit for the Symposium. I have to take the L on that one; he was right that it would get +a lot of interest. So that was really gratifying. In general, I think everything was super interesting, and every session +was well-attended. + +## Some photos + + + + + + + + + + + + + +- a mural. + + + +- There were bunnies all over campus at night! + + + +- Melody's Quantum Subalgebras talk + + + + + +- Alex's ABC Conjecture talk. Yay. An elliptic curves talk! + + + + + +- The Maths building is what used to be the Physics building. The outside says Henry, Ohm, Fresnel. + + + +- So good! Potato and veggies and salad with strawberries and I don't even know it all tasted delicious! + + + +- some kind of s'more desert + + + +- Jeremy's talk on positroids + + + +- Kevin's talk on Hopf Algebras + + + + + +- Some people made origami with their posters at the end of the Symposium! + + + +- Or even paper planes! + +## Okay +- I think I'm definitely heading to sleep at this point! +- It's going to be an interesting set of weeks as I'll be travelling again, while working. I actually prefer that, +as I find that I'm much more productive outside of campus. I'm particularly excited for summer, interning, going to +Maths grad summer school (yay) and for the upcoming forum I'll be attending in Fall, as well as my first +visit to an institute I've been communicating with weekly in Spring! It's been a wonderful +year for me, and it's all been super exciting, but I need to sleep I think! + +## And that's it