Faculty Votes New Standing Committee For Applied Math

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences has voted to establish a Standing Committee on Applied Mathematics. The Committee will have the power to recommend candidates for A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in Applied Mathematics. It will be formed on Dec. 1, and will begin giving degrees next year.

The motion was made by Harvey Brooks, dean of Engineering and Applied Physics, on behalf of the Committee on Applied Mathematics and Statistics. The committee, of which Dean Brooks is chairman, has worked out the degree programs.

Members of the committee feel that a need has arisen for specialists in applying advanced mathematical methods to scientific problems. At present both the Mathematics and Physics departments may give Ph.D. degrees in mathematical physics, and the Division of Engineering and Applied Physics may recommend degrees in applied mathematics. But the committee thinks that there is a new need for a special program.

Because the program will involve an overlap between the various departments which border on mathematics, the Standing Committee will be inter-departmental. Dean Broks guessed that the membership would not be very different from the membership of the Committee on Applied Mathematics and Statistics, which represents the departments of Mathematics, Physics, Engineering, Economics, Chemistry, and Statistics.