Tommy Kucera, 2017/05/04
 Seminar series : Colloquium Presenter : Tommy Kucera Department : Mathematics Institution : University of Manitoba Date : Thursday, May 4th, 2017 Time : : Location : 111 Armes

Tommy Kucera, 2017/05/04

Leonardo Pisano, Fibonacci'', (c. 1175--c. 1250), was the most talented and influential European mathematician of the Middle Ages. He popularized and advocated for the Hindu-Arabic numeral system in Europe, and his book, Liber Abaci'' (1202, 1228), the book of calculators'', was in use, especially in northern Italy, as the prime textbook for financial mathematics for several centuries. It includes, after a detailed discussion of how to compute using the Hindu-Arabic number system, an extensive list of practical examples showing how to solve everyday mathematical problems. Along the way, we see such things as solutions of small systems of linear equations (considering the cases of no solution, unique solution, or infinitely many solutions), the Chinese Remainder Theorem, and many other familiar things.

The first English translation did not appear until this century (L. Sigler, (Springer) 2002). I will discuss the history and content of this book, illustrated with examples from the text—including of course, the old problem'' of the rabbits.

This talk is meant to be accessible to undergraduate students.

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### News

MathCamp 2017 information is online.

In an effort to help students, the Math department has put together the LevelUp program. See details here. Video explaining registration process is here.

### Events

Friday, August 4th, 2017 at 15:30, 418 Machray Hall
Jose Aguayo
TBA
(Seminar series : Colloquium)