The Card Game Spot It!

  • Thursday, October 4, 2018
  • 3:40 PM–4:30 PM
  • North Hall 276

Martin Strauss, University of Michigan

Spot It! is based on the family of finite projective planes, which have many remarkable properties and applications. As time allows, we'll look at flash cards, the field of eight elements, the Hamming error-correcting code, and linear perspective in art and robotics. We'll also answer the following puzzle, related to group-testing in drug discovery: We are given 13 coins, and told that one is counterfeit and lighter than the others, or one is heavy, or all are true. We can use a pan balance and other coins known to be true. How do we find the counterfeit coin, if there is one, in three weighings?

Refreshments precede the talk at 3:30 p.m. in NH 282.