Collaborative Research: Special Meetings: The MPI Workshop

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This proposal is a collaborative effort amongst researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the University of Delaware, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute to expand and strengthen the Mathematical Problems in Industry (MPI) Workshop, an annual meeting run each June in cooperation with the Graduate Student Mathematical Modeling (GSMM) Camp. The MPI Workshop is a five-day meeting which attracts leading applied mathematicians, scientists and engineers from industry, universities and national laboratories. The focus of the Workshop is a set of problems brought by contributing participants from industry. These problems span a wide range of application areas, often in fluid and solid mechanics but also in mathematical biology, data analysis, and mathematical finance, among others. Work on the problems is done in vertically integrated teams consisting of the representatives from industry, senior and junior faculty, postdocs and graduate students. The main objective of the Workshop is to provide links between mathematicians at universities and scientists and engineers from industry for the mutual benefit of both sides.The MPI Workshop has run for many years, starting at RPI in 1985, but now run at other universities as well, including the University of Delaware and Worcester Polytechnic Institute, among others. For the past four years, the educational mission of the Workshop has grown significantly with the introduction of the GSMM Camp, another NSF-supported program. This four-day meeting, held during the week preceding the Workshop, is designed to promote problem solving and scientific communication skills. At the Camp, graduate students work together in teams, with the guidance of invited faculty mentors, on interdisciplinary problems typically inspired by industrial applications. The problems span a wide range of areas of application, and are carefully selected to promote a broad set of problem-solving skills. Students from the Camp also attend the Workshop, and the combined program exposes graduate students to real-world problems of current scientific interest, and provides them with a valuable educational and career-enhancing experience outside of the traditional academic setting. The interdisciplinary program consisting of the MPI Workshop and GSMM Camp is unique amongst universities in the United States. The present collaborative proposal addresses several ways in which the program can be expanded to improve links with industry and to enhance the research and educational opportunities provided by the Workshop. This expansion involves increased participation in the Workshop amongst early-career mathematicians (upper-level graduate students, postdocs and junior faculty) and invited high-impact faculty with targeted expertise, and increased participation from new industries in emerging areas. Additional plans include dissemination of mathematical results from the Workshop at other national meeting, and seminars with industry to promote contacts for future Workshop participation. The expanded program will have a broad impact on the education and development of early-career mathematicians, and on the interdisciplinary research of participating faculty. The Workshop also promotes collaborations with industry and will have an impact on the development and analysis of new technologies in industry. The intellectual merit of the program centers around the problems considered at the Workshop. Many of these problems have led to follow up research and new mathematical results, and it is expected that this will continue to be an outcome of the expanded problem-solving experience.