MCS 481: Final projects

Emily Dumas

About the final project

For the final project in MCS 481, you will research a topic in computational geometry (broadly construed) and produce both a written report and a 20-minute in-class presentation.

Key deadlines:

Proposal Fri, Apr 11
Report (and code) Fri, May 2, 10am CDT
Presentations Fri, May 9, 10:30am-12:30pm

Selecting a topic

If you do not have a topic in mind already, read the list of suggestions below. Once you have identified a topic of interest, do some preliminary reading about it in our textbook, other computational geometry references, journal articles, etc..

When you are satisfied that you have a concrete idea for a project, email your project proposal to ddumas@math.uic.edu. Use the subject line

    MCS 481 final project proposal
and include:

After I review your proposal, I will contact you and either approve the project or suggest revisions.

General guidelines

Your research should involve more than simply reading in our textbook. Show that you can make use of other resources.

Wikipedia has its uses, but it is not an authoritative reference. Your sources should be written by experts and subject to peer review.

Proposals for coding projects will be considered. The final product must still include a written report describing the algorithm(s) you implemented, the design choices you had to make, etc.

Project suggestions

Most of these suggestions are quite open-ended; narrowing and defining the scope of your project is an important aspect of developing your project proposal.

Other resources

Lists of "open" (i.e. unsolved) problems in discrete and computational geometry:
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