Fall 2022
Instructor: Sergey Fomin, 4868 East Hall, 764-6297, fomin@umich.edu
Course meets:
Section 1: Tuesday and Thursday, 1:00-2:20 PM
in 4096 East Hall.
Section 2: Tuesday and Thursday, 2:30-3:50 PM
in 4096 East Hall.
Office hours are held on Zoom: Monday, 4-5:50 PM and Friday, 12-12:50 PM
Grader: Xihang Yu, xihangyu@umich.edu.
Course webpage (basic info): http://www.math.lsa.umich.edu/~fomin/465f22.html.
More information (including general course policies) is available on the Math 465 Canvas page. Waitlisted students can be added to the course Canvas page on request. This is no substitute for registration and does not affect your chances for getting onto the official roster.
Lecture slides are available from the Canvas site.
Grade is based on homework (45%), quizzes(15%), and two 1.5-hour exams (20% each).
Homework: Approximately 10 problem sets. Homework is administered via Gradescope, see this link. On each problem set, only 5 problems will be graded. The lowest homework score will be dropped in the final calculation. There are no make-ups for late homework.
Quiz #1: (administered via Canvas): Friday-Saturday, September 2-3.
Quiz #2: (administered via Canvas): Friday-Saturday, September 9-10.
Exams are held in the same room where the class meets.
Each exam is 80 minutes long.
This course will not be graded on a curve, i.e., there are not a set percentage of each grade to be given out. Every student with the total score of 90% (resp., 80%, 70%, 60%) is guaranteed the final grade of A (resp., B or higher, C or higher, D or higher).
Prerequisites: Math 217 or permission of instructor. This is a proof-based undergraduate course: students are expected to understand rigorous mathematical proofs, and supply their own proofs on exams, quizzes, and in homework solutions.
Synopsis: This course introduces the fundamental notions, techniques, and theorems of enumerative combinatorics and graph theory.
Background: Combinatorics is the study of finite mathematical objects, including their enumeration, structural properties, design, and optimization. Combinatorics plays an increasingly important role in various branches of mathematics and in numerous applications, including computer science, statistics and statistical physics, operations research, bioinformatics, and electrical engineering.
Textbooks (none required):
We will not follow either textbook closely; the lectures and the books will often provide slightly different approaches.