Jackie Tran

Jackie is graduating from Warwick University in the UK and studied discrete mathematics for her BSc. Her favourite modules were complexity of algorithms and parallel algorithms. She is curious about how to make algorithms/solutions to problems more efficient and about the analysis of problems that are unsolvable. She is enthusiastic to be involved with the computerbasedmath.org project at Wolfram and hopes to make a positive impact in the education of mathematics in children at schools.

Random Number Generators

My project is going to be a module to teach children aged 12-14 about random numbers and how to test and generate them autonomously. I will start by making Mathematica Demonstrations for describing the randomness of a sequence. I will then describe linear congruential generators, linear-feedback shift registers, and the rule-30 cellular automaton. Rule 30 is well-known as an extremely suitable tool for generating random sequences such that the next value cannot be predicted or calculated. The computer-based math module is initiated by Wolfram Research to teach useful concepts of maths to children. It is a great opportunity to introduce cellular automatons to children and show them an interesting application of cellular automatons.

Rule 999666