Applied Mathematics and Computation Seminars

The AMC seminar is devoted to general topics in applied mathematics and computation. We welcome an interdisciplinary audience and speakers: faculty, researchers, and graduate students from mathematics, geosciences, computer science, engineering, atmospheric sciences, and other disciplines, to attend and present research talks in their fields as well as reaching across multiple fields. Both technical, tutorial, and expository presentations are welcome.

Attendees are encouraged to join the mailing list by sending an email to the organizer (M. Peszynska).

Students attending regularly are encouraged to sign up for (an appropriate section of) seminar credit under MTH 607. Non-OSU participants from outside academe are also encouraged to write an email to the organizers and provide their names and affiliation.

See below for upcoming seminars or access the seminar archive.

Organizers

Malgorzata Peszynska and Ralph E. Showalter.

Timing

Meetings are Fridays at noon.

Polynomials from random walks: accelerating the non-symmetric power iteration

Friday, December 5, 2025 – 12:00 pm

STAG 112

Speaker: Peter Cowal

ABSTRACT: In numerical linear algebra, an iterative method that alternates between applying a matrix and taking linear combinations of the result corresponds to applying a polynomial to a matrix. The action of the polynomial on the eigenvalues of the matrix determines the output of the method. In this talk, we'll present a class of polynomial families based on mean-zero random walks which are closely related to Faber polynomials, with useful boundedness and rapid-growth properties on the complex plane. Additionally, we'll present a momentum-based acceleration scheme for the power iteration that significantly outperforms the power iteration for certain classes of non-symmetric matrices with small spectral gaps.This talk is based on joint work with Nicholas Marshall and Sara Pollock. Read more.