I am a master's student in mathematics at Yeshiva University since January 2024, where I continued to participate in instructional efforts as a assistant and later an adjunct instructor since Summer 2024. I received my undergraduate and other master's degrees from
Peiyang ('Tientsin,' 'Tianjin') University,
Clemson University,
Hult International Business School, and
University of Pennsylvania respectively.
Previously, I worked on software documentation (or technical writing), software development and K-8 computer science education; I had tutored voluntarily students at different age levels (pre-K, secondary, and adults). Since recently, my leisure time is occasionally spared on some efforts in healthcare fundraising.
In Fall 2024, I'm taking Computational Topology, Mathematical Logic, and Mathematics of Finance, while instructing the single-variable calculus session at Yeshiva; throughout the week I try to audit mathematics seminars at CUNY-Graduate Center.
In Summer 2024 I was studying a 2023 workshop on Structural Equation Modeling while taking Intro to American Politics and Legal and Ethical Environment of Business along with a few vacational and academic visits to the Science Museum of Long Island (Manhasset, N.Y.), downtown Princeton and University, N.J., University of Lynchburg and Liberty University [.png], VA, and the New England area [.png] respectively.
Attended MAA's OPEN Math workshop on inclusive, active learning for the week of June 3rd as well as attending Team-Based Inquiry Learning for the week of June 24th. Scheduled to tentatively teach MAT 1412: Calculus I during the July semi-asynchronous session.
From July to August I was also teaching/hosting a (homeschooling) course for adolescent literacy on dialogic reading, on an important category of texts which would help adolescent as well as adult/senior or second-language learners of English contextualize much conversationally, both in oral and written forms.
In Spring 2024, I was taking Ordinary Differential Equations, Introduction to Analysis, Functions of a Complex Variable, and Linear Algebra (audit) while hosting a weekly recitation. In Fall 2023, I was taking Abstract Algebra I, Mathematical Statistics I, and auditing Calculus I, Calculus II, and Calculus III, all at the Department of Mathematics at West Chester University, while tutoring math and computer science topics for five hours a week there.
As of June 2023, I had already graduated from Graduate School of Education of University of Pennsylvania, and temporarily moved away from Philadelphia, PA.
MAT 1412: Calculus I (Yeshiva, Fall 2024)
MAT 1412: Calculus I (Yeshiva, Summer 2024)
Adolescent Literacy Series II: Sociodialogic Reading (Summer 2024)
MAT 2105: Linear Algebra I (Recitation TA at Yeshiva, Spring 2024)
Adolescent Literacy Series I: Socioconstitutional Literacy for Children and Adolescents (Winter 2022)
CPSC 212: Algorithms and Data Structures (TA at Clemson, Fall 2016)
CPSC/ECE 322: Introduction to Operating Systems (TA at Clemson, Spring 2016)
CPSC 404/604: Computer Graphics Images (TA at Clemson, Fall 2015)
Ongoing Research Projects
[..]
(If you have worked with me in a classroom or funded project, feel free to contact me for research opportunities.)
Topic:
Whole Language Approach and Multimodality for Situational Learning
| Language and Literacy, Adult Literacy, Teaching and Learning
|
(submitted to
ACEID2025 as poster work)
Topic: Bifurcations of Equilibrium States in the Vector Field Modeling of Catastrophic Events | Vector Calculus, Meteorological and Atmospheric Sciences
Description:
In catastrophe theory, an "evolutionary process" can be modeled by "a vector field in phase space" where each point of the phase space defines/corresponds to the "state of the system" (
Arnold, V. I. & transl. Wassermann, G. S. and Thomas, R. K., 1986, pp. 14). Suppose a multivariate vector field starts at an equilibrium state (a.k.a. fixed point) and the field is inherently continuous, then a
local bifurcation occurs when some of the parameter(s) change, causing the stability of such equilibrium to change. This article attempts to formulate the evolutionary process with the special attention on bifurcations, and use it to model typhoons and hurricanes. Case analyses include the
2005 Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana, the 2018 Florence in Carolinas, and also the
2024 North Atlantic hurricane season and the tropical storm
Beryl. Quantitatively, an eigenvalue analysis and test is used to determine bifurcating occurrences; in order to maximize practical insights, the author discusses, empirically, the benchmark for different levels of bifurcations associated with various disastrous magnitudes.
Left: Cone-shaped probable path of the storm center around Saturday June 29, 2024 (5 PM AST). USA Today.
Right: Hurricane Beryl makes landfall in Mexico Friday morning July 5, 2024. CNN Weather.
Topic: Asymmetric Tensor Field Analysis for Tropical Storm Data with a Parallel Formulation of the Bifurcations of Equilibrium States | Tensor Calculus, Empirial Data Analysis, Meteorological and Atmospheric Sciences
(abstract submitted to DDP 2024, pre-accepted)
Description:
Vector and tensor fields can be natural mathematical grounds for the modeling of pressure-induced natural disasters including tropical storms and hurricanes. Given a vector field, we say its constituent empirical data points are part of an associated "phase space" in which each point corresponds to the state of system. Because of the multivariate nature of the vector field, one way to begin the analysis is to find any equilibrium states, also known as fixed points, and look for potential "local bifurcations" and their associated parameters which could cause changes in the "stability" of a given equilibrium state. This work attempts to parallelize the vector field configuration with one under tensor fields by computing velocity gradients from the vector field into spatially salient, asymmetric tensor fields. With the special attention on bifurcations, such modeling used to be known as the model of evolutionary process of a catastrophic event. Empirical study attempts to inspect the 2005 Hurricane Katrina which took place in Louisiana for which wind field datasets are available which would make room for observations and insight.
This is inspired by the "catastrophe theory" formulation which is close to "dynamical systems" nowadays. Such data have some potentials: on one hand, it can turn theoretical, defining and extracting a topological space (with a customized metric) from the vector field data; on the other, it can become "computational" by using things like topological data analysis (TDA) and "predictive analytics" for weather prediction, which should've been a well-developed domain already (i.e., in weather reports, meteorology, etc.).
Topic: "Who's In My Seat?" – On What We Can Learn from God's Complaint
about Morons Who Don't Understand Asymmetries in
Sociobehavioral Patterns, Neuroscience, and Our Inherently Physical Universe
|
Positive Psychology, Self-Help, Dark Comedy and Satire, Physics
Background and Description: In the past few years I accumulated some ideas and interests related to political philosophy, in short, based upon/because of my special life trajectory through which my observations were unfortunately scarce and informative to my ideological thoughts; if I connected each of these thoughts with what I studied formally in graduate school (social science) and the books I read from time to time, it'd look like some that I wrote this past summer of 2024 here. I was hoping to address, in response partly to the issues on criminal justice on American campuses, the lack in conceptions on what was meant to be important, as well as what centrism should really be differentiated from neutrality (and goodness). The manuscript was written by backing up the thesis statement with several aspects, albeit not comprehensive in any systematic way; I thought of attaching this idea with the notion of "wokeness," but perhaps that would better be a separate topic and what I couldn't handle well.
In consideration of the usefulness of this manuscript of mine, I think it can serve as an informative text to draw references from and/or as a side angle for some people's either staying "in the middle" politically just for the purpose of itself, or making scholarly/political arguments that ahere bizzardly to a centric stance without prioritizing morality, social welfare, mutually-economic interests, and many more things of significant importance.
To reflect, the societal part of life has impressed upon us that our human activities and products are various, but not uniformly monotonic. However, the social movements, explicitly or informally driven by an overly politically correct lifestyle and sociopolitical outlook, add excruciating pressure as well as encourage people amorphously to be balanced and in particular "be in the middle" most of the time. In this article the author argues that when we stay, or even force ourselves, in the middle of something, even if the arrogant assumption was made that centrality or "middle-ness" seems to imply importance, we are missing points on the fact that the so-called "centers" of human civilization as well as the physical universe may not be us, but rather something higher than us and bigger than our own existence and where God is potentially positioned either constantly or occasionally.
—D.T.S. on Thursday October 3, 2024
Sun, D. (Mar. 2024). A Brief Analysis on an Experimentation-Driven Undergraduate Linear Algebra Instruction. Mina Rees NY Women and Math Conference. [slides]
Sun, D. (Oct. 2023). Properties of the Gamma Function. Friday Lunch with the Mathematics Student Association at West Chester University. [slides]
Sun, D. (May 2023). A Brief Survey of Elementary Algorithmic Literacy. Workshop of Decision Education Research. Alliance for Decision Education. [manuscript, poster]
Sun, D. (2023). Group-Contextualized Identity Politics and the Trolley Dilemma: The Failure of Kotoamatsukami and the Silent Struggles of Itachi and Shisui Uchiha in the Preindustrial Animation Naruto Shippuden. The Asian Conference on Ethics, Religion & Philosophy. https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2187-476X.2023.9 [slides]
Evans, C. & Sun, D. (Nov. 2022). Kevin Henkes and His Works–A Congenial Invitation. Author/Illustrator Study of EDUC 5335 Literature for Children and Adolescents. [slides, video, writeup]
Sun, D. (Dec. 2021). Algorithmic Problem-Solving. Saturday Math Tutoring at Minds Matter Philadelphia. [slides, video]
Sun, D. (Dec. 2021). Genres, the Adolescent Writer, and Situated Context of Reading. Inquiry III of EDUC 629. [slides]
Hartsfield, H. J. et al. (December 7, 2021). "Flexible Dimensionalities": An Examination of Multicultural Education Through Intersectional Lenses. [
book reflection,
premable,
notes,
slides]
Sun, D. (Apr. 2016). Seam Carving vs. Contour Tree: Topology-Aware Scalar Data Resizing? Visual Computing (VC) Lunch at School of Computing. [poster]
Sun, D. (Oct. 2015). Seam Carving: Magic to Steal Pixels Away Secretly. Three Minute Talks by School of Computing Graduate Student Association (SOCGSA). [abstract]
https://orcid.org/0009-0004-6833-4063