YOUNGSTOWN — On Saturday, February 24, six University of Mount Union students attended the PME Regional Math Conference at Youngstown State University; the annual math conference held by the Ohio Xi Chapter of Pi Mu Epsilon at Youngstown State.

According to the Mathematical Association of America’s website, YSU’s philosophy is to hold a conference that is entirely run by and for students. Faculty and well-known mathematicians are not invited to give presentations, so students have the opportunity to hold presentations and organize a conference in a way that they find the most interesting.

Out of the Mount Union students who attended, Jacek Strotz and Zach Perrico presented group research on an extension of a mathematical concept called a Turing Machine.

Of the presentation, Strotz said, “A typical Turing Machine operates in a one-dimensional space, but we modified our definition to allow it to operate in infinite dimensions. We created our own programming language (that we call TuringMachine++), as well as a work-in-progress website (https://linedex.net) that hosts, executes, and then displays the results of such code.”

Strotz said that the conference gave the students an opportunity to receive instant feedback about their project, and — although the conference is math-based — they were able to incorporate computer science as well, leading to a meaningful learning experience.

“The conference was overall a great experience. There were several other presenters that we were able to listen to as well, each with incredibly unique and equally fascinating projects,” said Strotz.

Learn more about Mount Union's math program and other opportunities available to students at mountunion.edu/math.