Colin Conrad Adams

"How can calculus help you survive the zombie apocalypse? Colin Adams, humor columnist for the Mathematical Intelligencer and one of today's most outlandish and entertaining popular math writers, demonstrates how in this zombie adventure novel. 'Zombies and Calculus' is the account of Craig Williams, a math professor at a small liberal arts college in New England, who, in the middle of a calculus class, finds himself suddenly confronted by a late-arriving student whose hunger is not for knowledge. As the zombie virus spreads and civilization crumbles, Williams uses calculus to help his small band of survivors defeat the hordes of the undead. Along the way, readers learn how to avoid being eaten by taking advantage of the fact that zombies always point their tangent vector toward their target, and how to use exponential growth to determine the rate at which the virus is spreading. Williams also covers topics such as logistic growth, gravitational acceleration, predator-prey models, pursuit problems, the physics of combat, and more. With the aid of his story, you too can survive the zombie onslaught. Featuring easy-to-use appendixes that explain the mathematics necessary to enjoy the book, 'Zombies and Calculus' is suitable for recent converts to calculus as well as more advanced readers familiar with multivariable calculus"--

Over a century old, knot theory is today one of the most active areas of modern mathematics. The study of knots has led to important applications in DNA research and the synthesis of new molecules. And it is having a significant impact on statistical mechanics and quantum field theory. Many of the problems discussed in knot theory, including those treated here, can be understood with only a background of high school algebra and can be solved by the curious amateur. All you need to begin is a piece of string, a little math, a little imagination, and Colin Adams's The Knot Book - the first book to make cutting-edge research in knot theory accessible to a nonspecialist audience. What are the different properties and classifications of knots? How do you determine whether a knot is actually knotted or can be untangled? What is the appropriate measure of the complexity of a knot? What does knot theory research offer to other sciences? In The Knot Book Colin Adams describes and illustrates the work being done to answer these questions. Starting with the simplest knot (the trivial knot or unknot), Adams guides readers through increasingly more intricate twists and turns of knot theory, exploring problems and theorems mathematicians now can solve, as well as those that remain open. He also looks at how knot theory is providing important insights in biology, chemistry, physics, and other fields. Included are hundreds of illustrations of knots (including a table at the end of the book displaying nearly 200 different knots) as well as worked examples, exercises open problems - even a few knot jokes and pastimes. Colin Adams explains knot theory with an enthusiasm and an informal style that makes this seemingly mysterious subject easy to approach. With The Knot Book and a mathematical background that includes no more than a familiarity with polynomials, you will be able to understand and work with some of the discipline's most modern and provocative ideas.