Digital Commons Network^™

Generalized Adinkra Homology, Jacqueline A. Stone

Senior Projects Spring 2011

Adinkras are graphs that encode the supersymmetric pairings between particles in physics. However they are also cubical complexes, which are structures built not only from points and lines, but also squares, cubes, and hypercubes, and therefore have higher dimensional topological structure. Additionally, Adinkras are equivalent to N-cubes quotiented by doubly-even codes of length N, which are a specific type of subgroup of Z2^N. Within this paper, we consider generalized Adinkras, which are N-cubes quotiented by any codes of length N.

Homology is an algebraic invariant of topological spaces. In order to learn more about their topology, we compute the homology …

Filtering Irreducible Clifford Supermodules, Julia C. Bennett

Senior Projects Spring 2011

A Clifford algebra is an associative algebra that generalizes the sequence R, C, H, etc. Filtrations are increasing chains of subspaces that respect the structure of the object they are filtering. In this paper, we filter ideals in Clifford algebras. These filtrations must also satisfy a “Clifford condition”, making them compatible with the algebra structure. We define a notion of equivalence between these filtered ideals and proceed to analyze the space of equivalence classes. We focus our attention on a specific class of filtrations, which we call principal filtrations. Principal filtrations are described by a single element in complex projective …

Elliptic Curves: Minimally Spanning Prime Fields And Supersingularity, Travis Mcgrath

Senior Projects Spring 2011

Elliptic curves are cubic curves that have been studied throughout history. From Diophantus of Alexandria to modern-day cryptography, Elliptic Curves have been a central focus of mathematics. This project explores certain geometric properties of elliptic curves defined over finite fields.

Fix a finite field. This project starts by demonstrating that given enough elliptic curves, their union will contain every point in the affine plane. We then find the fewest curves possible such that their union still contains all these points. Using some of the tools discussed in solving this problem, we then explore what can be said about the number …

Classifying Derived Voltage Graphs, Madeline Schatzberg

Senior Projects Spring 2011

Gross and Tucker’s voltage graph construction assigns group elements as weights to the edges of an oriented graph. This construction provides a blueprint for inducing graph covers. Thomas Zaslavsky studies the criteria for balance in voltage graphs. This project primarily examines the relationship between the group structure of the set of all possible assignments of a group to a graph, including the balanced subgroup, and the isomorphism classes of covering graphs. We examine connectedness, planarity, and chromatic number in the derived graph. Lastly we explain the future research possibilities involving the fundamental group.

A Mathematical Exploration Of Low-Dimensional Black Holes, Abigail Lauren Stevens

Senior Projects Spring 2011

In this paper we will be mathematically exploring low-dimensional gravitational physics and, more specifically, what it tells us about low-dimensional black holes and if there exists a Schwarzschild solution to Einstein's field equation in 2+1 dimensions. We will be starting with an existing solution in 3+1 dimensions, and then reconstructing the classical and relativistic arguments for 2+1 dimensions. Our conclusion is that in 2+1 dimensions, the Schwarzschild solution to Einstein's field equation is non-singular, and therefore it does not yield a black hole. While we still arrive at conic orbits, the relationship between Minkowski-like and Newtonian forces, energies, and geodesics …