Student Newspaper of the University of North Texas

LOGSA markets meeting

The Logistics Student Association will have its first meeting at the marketing department's logistics scholarships and awards reception at 5 p.m. today in the University Union Golden Eagle Suite.

Helpful hint for move-out day...start now

As the end of the year approaches, students living on campus will be sweating not just over finals, but out of hard labor.

Robert Ismert/NT Daily

Ridin' Around
NT alumni Jason Crawley and Sean Purtle ride past a recently unveiled sculpture outside the Art Building Monday.

'Week' more than numbers

By Brenda Edwards
Staff Writer

With finals only three weeks away, visions of derivatives, probabilities and numbers has begun to haunt students in math classes.

Whether or not math brings sweet dreams or nightmares, mathematical tools are essential in developing higher quality pictures on television, identifying cancerous tumors, bringing back visual images of Mars' landscape and warning people of dangerous weather patterns.

Through Math Awareness Week this week, students have the opportunity to learn about what tornadoes look like and challenge their peers in a math bee.

"We are trying to publicize mathematics as something that is useful, as opposed to a requirement," said Dr. John Quintanilla of the math faculty.

He said the student body will have a taste of how math can be applied to the real world.

Dr. James Serrin of the University of Minnesota will talk about the drafts that cause the violent, swirling motions in tornadoes at 4 p.m. Thursday in Eagle Student Services Center 255.

"It's designed for a popular audience so anyone can understand it," Quintanilla said.

Another event, the 10th Annual Integration Bee, is designed to challenge students to complete math problems associated with indefinite integrals, where students must find the derivative function.

All students can compete, but in order to win, students should be taking or have already completed Math 1720, the second semester of calculus.

"The contest is a whole lot of fun," said Dr. Henry Warchall of the math faculty, who is helping Dr. Ruth Michler of the math faculty to organize the event.

"It's kind of a reward for people who study a lot," he said. "It's a positive experience for everybody."

In evaluating the problems, students are out if they miss two. The person who lasts the longest wins.

"May the best person win," Warchall said.

The focus of this year's Math Awareness Week is "Mathematics and Imaging."

"There are a lot of real world problems that can be analyzed deeply utilizing mathematical tools," Quintanilla said.

He said his students have applied calculus to the strength of fishing line, the bounciness of basketballs and the loft ­ how high the ball is hit ­ of golf clubs.

"We wish to expose our undergraduates, both [math] majors and non-majors, to the usefulness of mathematics," Quintanilla said.

Imaging is involved in tomography, which uses X-rays to reconstruct a 3-D structure of what's inside a person's body without having to physically open them up. This can be used to detect tumors.

Another aspect of imaging includes using wavelet image compression to produce cleaner pictures. This is being considered in producing high-definition television.

"It allows you to remove unessential details in pictures," Warchall said.

Wavelength image compression also transfers visual images from Mars more quickly.

With the current technology, the Mars Pathfinder sends data 700 times slower than a typical modem, according to the NT Math Awareness Week website.

Students who are curious about the math events this week can find more information from the website at www.math.unt.edu/~johnq/maw/.