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  6. PX4514: MODELLING THEORY

PX4514: MODELLING THEORY (2016-2017)

Last modified: 28 Jun 2018 10:27


Course Overview

This course was designed to show you what you can do with everything you learnt in your degree. We will use mathematical techniques to describe a fast variety of “real-world” systems: spreading of infectious diseases, onset of war, opinion formation, social systems, reliability of a space craft, patterns on the fur of animals (morphogenesis), formation of galaxies, traffic jams and others. This course will boost your employability and it will be exciting to see how everything you learnt comes together.



Course Details

Study Type Undergraduate Level 4
Term Second Term Credit Points 15 credits (7.5 ECTS credits)
Campus None. Sustained Study No
Co-ordinators
  • Professor Marco Thiel

Qualification Prerequisites

None.

What courses & programmes must have been taken before this course?

  • One of Engineering (EG) (Studied) or Mathematics (MA) (Studied) or Physics (PX) (Studied)
  • Any Undergraduate Programme (Studied)

What other courses must be taken with this course?

None.

What courses cannot be taken with this course?

None.

Are there a limited number of places available?

No

Course Description

The course content reflects the learning outcomes and contains the material for the students to realize these. This course bridges the gap between standard courses in physical sciences, where successful mathematical models are described, and scientific research, where new mathematical models have to be developed. Students will learn the art of mathematical modelling, which will enable them to develop new mathematical models for the description of natural systems. Examples from a wide range of phenomena will be discussed, eg. from biology, ecology, engineering, physics, physiology and psychology. A focus will be the critical interpretation of the mathematical models and their predictions. The applicability of the models will be assessed and their use for the respective branch of the natural sciences will be discussed.

Contact Teaching Time

Information on contact teaching time is available from the course guide.

Teaching Breakdown

More Information about Week Numbers


Details, including assessments, may be subject to change until 30 August 2024 for 1st term courses and 20 December 2024 for 2nd term courses.

Summative Assessments

1st attempt: Continuous assessment (assignments & projects (80%); oral exam (20%)). 6 to 7 in course assessments (solutions to be presented on the board during tutorials), one presentation of the project, a four page manuscript using LaTeX in the style of PRL.

Resit: Mini modelling project (80%) and oral exam (20%). Only the marks obtained at the first attempt can count towards Honours classification.

Formative Assessment

Formative assessment will be by means of a continuous dialogue with the lecturer and interaction with the same during the problem solving exercises and the developement of models.

Feedback

Due to the nature of the (primarily) continuous assessment of the course - summative assessment will be on a continuous ongoing basis as project work is marked.

Course Learning Outcomes

None.
 

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