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Federico Ardila

Federico Ardila

  • Email: federicosfsu.edu
  • Website
  • Biosketch PDF
  • San Francisco State University
  • Status: Faculty
  • Department: Math,
  • Will Mentor: Doctoral students, Pre-doctoral students

Areas of Expertise

Pure Mathematics, Applied Mathematics,

Research Interests

The investigation of objects in algebra, geometry, topology, and applications by understanding their underlying combinatorial structure.

Bio

I was born in Bogot, Colombia, and have lived in the US for more than half of my life. I am strongly connected with students and researchers from underrepresented groups in the US and in Colombia. In both locations I have mentored many Ph.D., Master's, undergraduate, and high school students. In the US, I formally mentor Master's students at SFSU (most of whom continue on to Ph.D. program in mathematics) and Ph.D. students at Berkeley. I received my B.S. in Mathematics and my Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics (Combinatorics) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After a joint 2-year postdoc at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI) in Berkeley and Microsoft Theory Group in Seattle, I joined the Mathematics Department at San Francisco State University in 2005. I am co-Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Combinatorial Theory, Series A. I study objects in algebra, geometry, topology, phylogenetics, and optimization by understanding their underlying combinatorial structure. I have worked on several projects aimed at increasing diversity in the mathematical community, including the SFSU-Colombia Combinatorics Initiative (2005-current), the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute Undergraduate Program (MSRI-UP) REU in Berkeley, the Colombian and International Mathematical Olympiads, and the San Francisco Math Circles. Partly thanks to this work, I received a CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation, an Emerging Scholar Award from Diverse Issues in Higher Education, and an Award for Outstanding Achievement and Service from the MIT-Harvard Club de Colombia.