One of the most challenging questions a mathematics graduate student
must ask is, "Should I continue in academia or go into
industry?" I asked myself that question. I also asked relatives,
my friends, other graduate students, my advisors, etc. If I took a
survey of their responses, I probably would have ended up with 50%
suggesting academia and 50% suggesting industry. I followed their
advice and took an industrial postdoc position where I worked 50% of
the time in academia and 50% of the time in industry. Ultimately, I
chose to go into industry. I am now a software engineer on the MATLAB
indexing team, where I am responsible for ensuring indexing operations
are correct, consistent, and fast. In this talk, I will present
examples of how scientists and engineers are using MathWorks products
to solve challenging real-world problems. I will also tell you the
story about how I made the transition from academia to industry, from
programming in MATLAB to programming MATLAB.
Biographical note:
Andy received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Utah in
2014. In his dissertation, he made extensive use of MATLAB while
studying electrical impedance tomography and cloaking due to anomalous
localized resonance. He then accepted an industrial postdoctoral
position at the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications at the
University of Minnesota. While there, he continued his work on
cloaking; he also worked on oil exploration algorithms in
collaboration with scientists from Schlumberger-Doll Research Center
in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 2016, he began his position as a
software engineer at MathWorks in Natick, Massachusetts.
Snacks will be served.