About the Experimental Mathematics Lab

• allow students of various levels (Bachelor, Master and PhD) to participate in computational mathematics projects, helping them to develop their understanding of mathematics but also their programming and modeling capabilities,
• develop new visualization tools and new images (or even movies or 3d printouts) of mathematical objects,
• develop modules for computing on mathematical notions, to be used either independently or as libraries for existing mathematical computing environment,
• make advances in mathematical questions, when progress can be made by applying computational tools --- for instance for classification, for finding patterns or when a counter-example can be searched for.

We believe that participating in such computational mathematics projects can be an important addition to the ``traditional'' teaching of mathematics. One reason is that it gives students the opportunity to interact in a very practical way with elaborate mathematical notions, to the point where it often allows them to discover a new way to do and think about mathematics. Another is that it helps them develop programming skills that are useful well beyond their studies.

Among the students who could be involved we can single out for instance:

• third-year mathematics students, who could participate in such a project in the setting of their Bachelor thesis,
• first-year master students who could be involved as a part of their student project,
• second-year master students whose Master thesis could be linked to the EML,
• other students, at various stages of their studies, who have good academic results in their ``traditional'' courses, could be involved for additional credits.

Our project is based on a number of successful experiments conducted, over the years, in a number of universities. For instance:

• The Experimental Geometry Lab at the University of Maryland,
• the Illinois Geometry Lab at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
• The Experimental Algebra and Geometry Lab at the University of Texas -- Pan American.

The concept of Experimental Mathematics is nowadays a well established one, connecting Mathematics, Computer Science and Communiciation Technology.