Motivations

This workshop which is funded within the framework of the Volkswagen Foundation Funding Initiative "Symposia and Summer Schools", is aimed globally at promoting capacity building in terms of research and training in computer algebra and applications, discussions and development of new ideas, development and enhancement of networking including south-south cooperation.


Objectives

The workshop is expected to:

  • Present to a broad audience the great potential of computer algebra for research and teaching of mathematical sciences, from an interdisciplinary point of view, in order to raise awareness of the importance of this modern tool and to promote its use in Africa.
  • Bring together international experts, academics and PhD students mostly from the Central Africa sub-region, with good representation of women, in order to deliver an initial training and some advanced lectures in computer algebra and to create a community of practice in the use of computer algebra for research and teaching of mathematical sciences in Africa, as well as to promote new international collaborations including south-south collaborations, and enhance research in this domain.


Description

The workshop will mainly be composed of the following activities:

  • Intensive preliminary training sessions on computer algebra on October 6-7, 2017
  • Plenary talks by renowned experts in the domain to present the state of art in various aspects of computer algebra and their applications.
  • Tutorials by the same experts to discuss deeply and provide detailed explanations to PhD students, Postdocs and Junior Lecturers.
  • Training sessions to be delivered by experts for the benefit of young scientists to enable a good mastering and proper understanding of the great potential of computer algebra. These junior scientists are expected to take over and popularise and continue to train their colleagues in their home universities.
  • Contributed talks by participants to enable young researchers to present talks/achievements on their research interests in order to receive feedback from experts and also to enable networking.
  • Coffee and lunch breaks combined with social events will enable additional discussions and interactions.
Computer algebra has various applications in multidisciplinary settings most of which will be covered in one way or the other in the lectures and training sessions:
  1. Solution of differential equations;
  2. Symbolic factorization of polynomials solves many important mathematical questions;
  3. Zeilberger type algorithms to find recurrence and differential equations for series and integrals;
  4. Resultants or Gröbner bases solve multivariate polynomial equation systems;
  5. Applications to coding theory and cryptography;
  6. Algorithms in group theory.
The workshop is considered as an introduction to computer algebra. Therefore the topics of the workshop concentrate on the following:
  1. Implementation of elementary computer algebra algorithms;
  2. Solving polynomial equation systems (using resultants or Gröbner bases).
    3. 

  3. Differential and difference equations.
    4. 

  4. Computer Algebra and Group Theory: The GAP system
  5. Training sessions.


Co-organisers

Prof. Dr. Wolfram Koepf
Universität Kassel
Fachbereich Mathematik und Naturwissenschaften
Institut für Mathematik
Heinrich-Plett-Str. 40
34132 Kassel
Personal web page

Research Domain: Mathematics 		Prof. Dr. Mama Foupouagnigni
African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS)
Centre President
P.O.B. 608
Limbe South West
Cameroon
AIMS Cameroon

Research Domain: Mathematics
Special Research Interests: Orthogonal Polynomials, Special Functions of Mathematical Physics, Computer Algebra