Math 272: Linear Algebra with Applications (Spring 2018)
This course concerns the core theory of linear algebra, with specific attention to applications.
Office Hours
There are many sources of help in this class; you should make use of all of them! Here are a few places you can go with your questions.
- My regular office hours in SMUD 510: Tuesday 2:45-4:15 (with my dog), Wednesday 1:15-3:45, and Friday 1:30-2:30 in SMUD 510.
- Rosy Rohling (Math Fellow) office hours: Monday 6-8:30 in SMUD 204; Wednesday 8-10 in SMUD 207.
- Andrew Miller (Q Fellow) office hours in Merrill 202: see his calendar.
Handouts and other items
- Syllabus
- W 01/24: Augmented matrices of linear systems
- M 01/29: REF and RREF summary
- F 02/09: Proof-writing examples
- F 03/02: Least-squares notes
- M 03/05: The Supreme Court discussses “orthogonal”
- M 4/02: Approximation in inner product spaces and Fourier approximation
- F 4/27: Markov chains demo notebook
Homework
- Problem Set 1 (due 1/31 by midnight)
- Problem Set 2 (due 2/7 by midnight)
- Problem Set 3 (due 2/14 by midnight) (Partial solutions)
- Problem Set 4 (due 2/21 by midnight)
- Problem Set 5 (due 3/7 by midnight) (Partial solutions).
- Problem Set 6 (due 3/21, by midnight).
- Problem Set 7 (due 3/28, by midnight).
- Problem Set 8 (due 4/4, by midnight).
- Problem Set 9 (due 4/18, by midnight).
- Problem Set 10 (due 4/30, by midnight). Supplement solutions
Mathematica Labs
Mathematica is available for all college-owned computers, and is already installed in all of the public labs, e.g. in on the first floor of Seeley Mudd. If you are using a public computer, be sure to save your work to your personal user folder, or you may end up losing your work when you log out. On the other hand, you should also be sure to delete any files accidentally saved to the desktop or hard drive of these public computers to ensure that they are not visible to the next person who uses that computer.
Mathematica can also be installed on your own computer through the college’s software drive, or accessed through a remote desktop connection. The college has a limited number of Mathematica licenses, so be sure to quit Mathematica when you are finished; otherwise, you may prevent another student from being able to use it.
During the in-class labs, you may feel free to bring your own laptop and use it instead of the lab machines, as long as you have installed Mathematica.
- 1/30: Introduction to Mathematica (submit by email by Wednesday night 1/31).
- 2/13: Least Squares (submit by email by Wednesday night 2/14).
- 3/06: Linear Combinations (submit by email by Wednesday night 3/7).
- 3/27: The Gram-Schmidt procedure (submit by email by Wednesday night 3/28)
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4/17: PageRank (submit by email by Wednesday night 4/18)
- Based on this article by Kurt Bryan and Tanya Leise.
- 4/24: Fibonacci via diagonalization (submit by Monday night, 4/30)
Exams
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Midterm 1: Tuesday, February 27.
- Exam / Solutions
- Sample exam / Solutions (Note: the sample exam does not necessarily cover all topics that may appear on the exam, but has a similar length and format)
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Midterm 2: Tuesday, April 10.
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Final exam: Thursday, May 10, 2pm in BEBU 107.
- Exam / Solutions
- Sample exam / Solutions
- Old final exams (note: coverage varies from year to year. If you are unsure whether an old exam question relates to something we did in class, feel free to ask)