Juggling Permutations of The Integers
Dr. Ronald L. Graham
AT&T Research Labs
In a certain sense, the art of juggling is a physical realization of many of the principles that mathematicians and computer scientists know and love. These include the search for patterns, the design and analysis of appropriate algorithms, and the prospect of facing problems of unbounded difficulty. In particular, juggling is typically a very discrete activity, and as such, is governed by a rich family of combinatorial constraints. Recently, a new and unexpectedly simple way of describing juggling patterns has been discovered. This has led to a bewildering array of previously unknown patterns, as well as several new combinatorial theorems relating linear extensions of partially-ordered sets to chromatic polynomials of associated graphs. In this talk we will describe these developments, and attempt to demonstrate some of these new tricks.
Thursday, September 10, 1998
4:10 p.m. in MA 109
Coffee/Tea/Treats 3:30 p.m. in MA 104 (Lounge)
* This talk is sponsored by and presented as an element of The University of Montana President's Lecture Series. The Big Sky Conference is also sponsored by the National Science Foundation and the Department of Mathematical Sciences.
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