Senior Honors Thesis

MATH 4993, the Senior Honors Thesis, is required for Departmental Honors in mathematics. The thesis must be supervised by a member of the regular teaching faculty in mathematics. You and your thesis adviser should also select a second reader, who can be a member of the regular teaching faculty from any department. The thesis should involve investigating a topic not covered in a regular course, and should be a substantial report (appropriate for 3 hours credit) based on the results of your investigation.

Both the thesis adviser and the second reader will determine questions of thesis form, magnitude, and ultimate acceptability. The department requires that you make a public presentation of your results, and that you provide copies of the approved thesis to the University Honors Program Office and to the Undergraduate Director in Mathematics by the end of final exam week in the semester you complete the thesis.

Here are possible avenues to help you choose a thesis topic:

• Choose a topic that you want to investigate and then seek out a faculty member interested in working on that subject.
• Develop a suitable project from material taught in class.
• Choose a professor with whom you would like to work and ask that person to suggest possible topics.
• Work at a summer research internship. This can give you excellent ideas for an Honors Thesis, and is highly recommended.
• Build on ideas in the ``Mathematics'' section of the Department's Math Major's Monthly.
• Read articles in the American Mathematical Monthly, Mathematics Magazine, the Pi Mu Epsilon Journal, Quantum, and other journals. You may also enjoy expository books such as The Mathematical Tourist by Ivars Peterson, A History of  by Petr Beckmann, or any of the books by Martin Gardner.

See Section 3.2 for more ideas. Honors students should also feel free to consult with the Undergraduate Director, the Honors Liaison, or any other faculty member for suggestions.