Mathematics Awareness Week 1998

"Mathematics and Imaging"

Date:         Fri, 30 Jan 1998 17:23:26 -0500
From: Joint Policy Board for Mathematics 
Subject:      MAW ANNOUNCEMENT

Following is the final announcement for Mathematics
Awareness Week 1998. It will soon be mailed -- along with
the MAW 1998 poster -- to the usual folks (mathematical
sciences department chairs and many others).

Please share info on the MAW events you are planning for 1998.


ANNOUNCEMENT

To:    Mathematical Sciences Community

Date:  February, 1998

Re:    MATHEMATICS AWARENESS WEEK, April 26 - May 2, 1998

Mathematics Awareness Week 1998, to be held April 26 - May 2, is the
mathematical sciences community's opportunity to schedule local events
celebrating the excitement, versatility, and importance of
mathematics. We invite you to use the enclosed MAW 1998 materials and
the resources on the MAW website to inform your colleagues, your
students, and the public about the value of mathematics. The MAW web
address is http://forum.swarthmore.edu/maw/.

The MAW 1998 theme is Mathematics and Imaging. Mathematics is an
essential element of imaging in fields as diverse as medicine,
computer science, and space exploration, and many other settings as
well. These and other aspects of mathematics in imaging are described
briefly below and are explored in greater detail in an article on the
MAW website.

Mathematics Awareness Week is an excellent vehicle for communicating
with new audiences about the relevance of mathematics. Here are some
suggestions for MAW activities:

*       Design your own World Wide Web page and link it to the
    national MAW page;

*       Explore joint programs with your colleagues in other fields,
    especially those related to, or dependent on, imaging;

*       Encourage your student chapter to organize campus events;

*       Request appropriate state or local officials to issue a
    proclamation declaring April 26 - May 2, 1998 to be Mathematics
    Awareness Week in your municipality or state--a sample
    proclamation can be found on the MAW website;

*       Invite your local legislators or other elected officials to
    visit your department--public officials appreciate opportunities
    to speak with faculty about their public policy concerns;

*       Tailor the enclosed sample news release so that it includes
    details on your MAW activities and mail it to your local print and
    broadcast media outlets--you can find media listings from books in
    the reference section of your library, or better yet, work with
    your institution's public information office;

*       Check the MAW website for an extensive listing of activities
    and events that others have done in the past to observe MAW.

*       Display the enclosed poster in a high-traffic area--
    additional posters can be purchased via the MAW website;

Any activity or event that spotlights mathematics and its
contributions is appropriate for MAW. And if the week of April 26
- May 2 doesn't work for you because of exams, spring break, or
other commitments, you may schedule MAW 1998 activities any week
in March, April, or May.

Please help us share Mathematics Awareness Week by sending us
newspaper clips on mathematical topics appearing in your local
papers and community magazines this spring and posting
announcements and reports of your MAW activities on the MAW
electronic mailing list
http://forum.swarthmore.edu/maw/mawlist.html.

The JPBM and its member societies--the American Mathematical
Society, the Mathematical Association of America, and the Society
for Industrial and Applied Mathematics--appreciate the involvement
of the American mathematical sciences community in Mathematics
Awareness Week.

If you have any questions or would like further suggestions,
please do not hesitate to contact the JPBM office. Thank you in
advance for your interest and efforts to celebrate the
mathematical sciences with new and larger audiences this spring.

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Mathematics and Imaging

Mathematics is an essential element of imaging in fields as diverse as
medicine, computer science, and space exploration, and many other
settings as well. For instance, medicine benefits from the techniques
of tomography, including cutting-edge ideas like electrical impedance
tomography that may greatly improve the detection of cancerous tumors,
and from level set and marching methods that can extract images of
beating hearts from MRI images.

Computer imaging depends upon a whole range of mathematical tools.
Wavelet transforms permit efficient illumination of two-dimensional
representations of three-dimensional scenes so that the images created
by computer graphics are realistic and visually pleasing. Familiar
references like Microsoft's Encarta encyclopedia and its 7,000 color
images fit on a single CD-ROM because of fractal image compression.

Image compression is also one of the essential tools of space
exploration. For example, the scientists monitoring transmissions from
the Mars Pathfinder will be receiving data at a mere 40 bytes per
second (about 700 times slower than a typical modem!) when the
spacecraft reaches Mars. Compression routinely increases the effective
transmission rate of image data by a factor of fifteen or twenty.

New techniques are being developed that will raise compression ratios
into the hundreds while still preserving essential features of the
image. One of these new ideas, wavelet image compression , has already
enabled electronic storage and retrieval of the FBI's vast archive of
fingerprint records.

Image restoration tools can extract additional detail otherwise hidden
in images from a wide range of sources, including satellites, medical
imaging devices, telescopes, and even amateur video pictures submitted
as courtroom evidence. Images from astronomical telescopes are cleaner
to begin with if they have benefited from the control strategies of
active and adaptive optics that minimize degradation from atmospheric
blur and mechanical tremors.

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SAMPLE NEWS RELEASE
For Your Institution/Company Letterhead


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                       CONTACT:      your name
Date Mailed: month day, 1998                             your phone
                                                 your email address


HEADLINE ABOUT YOUR SPECIFIC EVENT(S) OR PARTICIPATION
IN MATHEMATICS AWARENESS WEEK, April 26 - May 2, 1998


(Your City) . . . . . Mathematics and Imaging is the theme for
Mathematics Awareness Week 1998, which will be observed nationwide
from April 26 - May 2. INCLUDE INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR SPECIFIC
EVENT(S) HERE.

The three mathematical societies organizing Mathematics Awareness Week
selected Mathematics and Imaging to highlight the many significant
contributions mathematics makes to areas important to our lives.
Mathematics is an essential element of imaging in fields as diverse as
medicine, computer sciences, and space exploration, and many other
settings as well.

The 1998 Mathematics Awareness Week color poster, Mathematics and
Imaging, depicts the role mathematics plays in representing images
digitally for storage, transmission, and analysis. It shows a
photographic image (of a mandrill) which is decomposed using modern,
wavelet-based techniques into three separate images that preserve
different features of the original in an extremely efficient manner.
Images were provideby Professor Ronald Coifman of Yale University's
Department of Mathematics.

During Mathematics Awareness Week celebrations take place at colleges,
universities, and research laboratories across the country. Special
events taking place this year include public lectures, mathematical
games and competitions, and special days that bring high school
students to college campuses where they are introduced to mathematics
departments and faculty.

Extensive information about Mathematics Awareness Week--including the
theme poster and other visuals, an annotated essay with links to many
other related sites, and news of MAW celebrations taking place around
the country--can be found on the MAW website at
http://forum.swarthmore.edu/maw/.

Mathematics Awareness Week is coordinated by the Joint Policy Board
for Mathematics on behalf of three national mathematical
organizations--the American Mathematical Society, the Mathematical
Association of America, and the Society for Industrial and Applied
Mathematics. Previous MAW themes have included Mathematics and the
Internet, Mathematics and Decision-Making, Mathematics and Symmetry,
and Mathematics and Medicine.

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