Prizes were awarded to University of Sheffield maths students who took part in the 2021 edition of the International Mathematics Competition (IMC) for University Students.
Seven Sheffield students competed with almost 600 others from more than 100 different universities across more than 50 different countries.
Philip Kmentt came within two points of a second prize, winning a third prize alongside Hernan Ibarra Mejia and Jiachen Qian. Honourable mentions were awarded to Ziyi Ou, Bowen Xiong and Jai Schrem, and Jiayi He was awarded a certificate.
The competition took place online, with two four-hour long problem solving sessions across two days. Each session included four problems, selected from analysis (real and complex), linear algebra, algebra, combinatorics and probability.
Dr Dimitrios Roxanas, who helped prepare the Sheffield students for the competition and acted as team leader, said: "This was our second time participating in the IMC, which again was held online due to Covid restrictions. While the social aspect was unfortunately lost, it was still a good experience for our students.
“I see this event as an opportunity for them to test, and push, their understanding of undergraduate mathematics, and along the way become better problem solvers, learn new topics, and more importantly, get used to challenging themselves and to not giving up easily!
“Unlike homework and university exam problems, the IMC problems are (mostly) devoid of context, and because of that it is not immediately clear how one can make progress.
“The solvers have to think about researchers: test small cases, construct examples, look for patterns, and formulate claims and conjectures. This is a good mindset to develop early on, and crucial for those interested in postgraduate studies and a career in academia.”
The Sheffield students who took part in the IMC had also been participants at School of Mathematics and Statistics Advanced Problem Seminars, a friendly and competition-free environment for students to interact with staff members and work together on interesting maths problems.
Maths students interested in taking part in the seminars can join a mailing list to find out about future sessions.