Faculty development workshop on complex functions and partial differential equations

A faculty development workshop on Complex Functions and Partial Differential Equations was organized by the Department of Mathematics, Chitkara University, Himachal Pradesh, for five days.

Faculty members from various places across the region, along with some students, were a part of this workshop that enabled them to delve deep into complex valued functions or simply complex functions.

The workshop that spanned across five days emphasized on not just complex functions and partial differential equations but on natural phenomena and engineering processes too.

Faculty members were able to know exactly how complex numbers give an extension of the real numbers. The workshop also helped appreciate how throwing problems into a more general context may enlighten one about a specific context (e.g. solving real integrals by doing complex integration; Taylor series of a complex variable illuminating the relationship between real function that seem unrelated – e.g. exponentials and trigonometric functions).

The faculty members after the workshop were able to learn techniques of complex analysis that make practical problems easy (e.g. graphical rotation and scaling as an example of complex multiplication).

They were also able to present the general features of partial differential equations.

Those who attended the workshop ad a fair idea about discussing the relationship between the type of physical problem being solved.

Resource person for the workshop were Dr Sita Ram, Ms. Neha Kumra and the convener were Ms. Neha Kumra, Dr Sita Ram.