Seminar Topics in Applied Geometry

In this course, we will explore the concept of Symmetry, guided by the book “The Symmetries of Things” by Conway, Burgiel and Goodman-Strauss. The aim of the first part of this course is to describe and enumerate all the symmetries found in repeating patterns on surfaces. To prove that this enumeration is accurate, we then cover the beautiful ideas from topology and algebra that form the basis for these conclusions. This will be followed by seminars prepared by the course participants on selected topics from the latter part of the book, such as group theory, tilings or higher dimensional symmetry.