The Reid Lecture Series

The Reid Lecture Series is an annual public lecture geared toward showing a broad audience the beauty of mathematics. It is hosted each spring by the �� Department of Mathematics. The event is open to the local and campus communities, including engaged high school and college students from other campuses and interested community members.

The Reid Lecture was established in 2015 and has continued with support from Founding Library Dean and Librarian Emerita Marion Reid and Founding Faculty Member and Professor Emeritus K. Brooks Reid.

Mathemagic of Sea Ice, Semiconductors, & Harry Potter

$reidlecture$

Thursday April 17, 2025
6-7 PM
USU Ballroom

Graphene, osteoporosis, and invisibility cloaks may seem unrelated. However, through the unifying lens of mathematics, problems from disparate fields can be viewed in the same light and solved with the same math. For example, sea ice plays a critical role in Earth’s climate system yet shares striking similarities to many other composite materials. We’ll illustrate how our sea ice studies advance medical imaging and twistronics, as well as climate science and polar ecology. After all, the math doesn't care if it's sea ice or bone. We’ll conclude with a brief video from our Arctic and Antarctic expeditions featuring math students, and a few penguins!

Ken Golden is a Distinguished Professor of Mathematics and Adjunct Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Utah. His main research interests are in mathematics of sea ice and climate, polar ecology, composite materials, statistical physics, and remote sensing. He's been on nineteen polar expeditions to obtain data that inform sea ice models, and given over 500 invited lectures on six continents, including four presentations to the U.S. Congress. Golden has won awards for teaching, mentoring, and science communication. His research has been covered by media around the world, including profiles in Science, Scientific American, Physics Today, and by the BBC. He is an Inaugural Fellow of the American Mathematical Society, a Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, cited for “extraordinary interdisciplinary work on the mathematics of sea ice,” a Fellow of the Electromagnetics Academy, and a Fellow of the Explorers Club, whose members have included Neil Armstrong and Jane Goodall.

Reid Lecture Series Archives

2015: The inaugural Reid Lecture given by Dr. Ron Graham, UC San Diego Department of Mathematics and Computer Science.
2016: Dr. Francis Su, Harvey Mudd College, Department of Mathematics.
2017: Dr. Alice Silverberg, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, UC Irvine.
2018: Dr. William Dunham, Mathematical Historian, Distinguished Author, and Research Associate in Mathematics at Bryn Mawr.
Spring 2019: Dr. Talithia Williams, Department of Mathematics, Harvey Mudd College.
Fall 2019: Dr. Ron Gould, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics and Heilbrun Distinguished Fellow, Emory University.
2021: Dr. Peter Winkler, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Dartmouth College
2022: Dr. Robin Wilson, Emeritus Professor of Pure Mathematics at the Open University, Emeritus Professor of Geometry at Gresham College, London, and a former Fellow of Keble College, Oxford University.
2023: Dr. Ami Radunskaya, Linghurn H. Burkhead Professor of Mathematics, Pomona College.
2024: Dr. Álvaro Lozano-Robledo, Department of Mathematics, University of Connecticut.