Julianna Sophia Tymoczko (born 1975) is an American

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

whose research connects algebraic geometry and

algebraic combinatorics Algebraic combinatorics is an area of mathematics that employs methods of abstract algebra, notably group theory and representation theory, in various combinatorial contexts and, conversely, applies combinatorial techniques to problems in alg ...

, including

representation theory Representation theory is a branch of mathematics that studies abstract algebraic structures by ''representing'' their elements as linear transformations of vector spaces, and studies modules over these abstract algebraic structures. In essen ...

Schubert calculus In mathematics, Schubert calculus is a branch of algebraic geometry introduced in the nineteenth century by Hermann Schubert, in order to solve various counting problems of projective geometry (part of enumerative geometry). It was a precursor o ...

, equivariant cohomology, and Hessenberg varieties. She is a professor of mathematics at

Smith College Smith College is a private liberal arts women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith and opened in 1875. It is the largest member of the historic Seven Sisters colleges, a group of elite women's c ...

Education and career

Tymoczko grew up in

Western Massachusetts Western Massachusetts, known colloquially as “Western Mass,” is a region in Massachusetts, one of the six U.S. states that make up the New England region of the United States. Western Massachusetts has diverse topography; 22 colleges and u ...

, and studied

discrete mathematics Discrete mathematics is the study of mathematical structures that can be considered "discrete" (in a way analogous to discrete variables, having a bijection with the set of natural numbers) rather than "continuous" (analogously to continu ...

at Smith College as a high school student. She was an undergraduate at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

, and wrote a senior thesis on the

homotopy groups of spheres In the mathematical field of algebraic topology, the homotopy groups of spheres describe how spheres of various dimensions can wrap around each other. They are examples of topological invariants, which reflect, in algebraic terms, the structure ...

, ''The -components of the stable homotopy groups of spheres'', with Joe Harris and Michael J. Hopkins as faculty mentors. After graduating in 1998, she moved to

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the n ...

for graduate study, and completed her Ph.D. there in 2003. Her dissertation, ''Decomposing Hessenberg Varieties over Classical Groups'', was supervised by Robert MacPherson. After being a Clay Liftoff Fellow, NSF Postdoctoral Fellow, and Hildebrandt Assistant Professor at the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, she took a tenure-track position at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized into 12 coll ...

in 2007. In 2011 she returned to Smith College as a faculty member. She was promoted to full professor in 2019.

Recognition

Tymoczko was elected as a Fellow of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings ...

in the 2020 class, for "contributions to algebraic geometry and combinatorics, and for outreach and mentorship".

Personal life

Tymoczko is one of three children of Thomas Tymoczko, a logician and philosopher of mathematics at

, and comparative literature scholar Maria Tymoczko of the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...

. Her brother,

Dmitri Tymoczko Dmitri Tymoczko is a composer and music theorist. His music, which draws on rock, jazz, and romanticism, has been performed by ensembles such as the Amernet String Quartet, the Brentano Quartet, Janus, Newspeak, the San Francisco Contemporary Play ...

, is a music composer and music theorist. She is married to

Marshall Poe Marshall Tillbrook Poe (born December 29, 1961) is an American historian, writer, editor and founder of the New Books Network, an online collection of podcast interviews with a wide range of non-fiction authors. He has taught Russian, European, E ...

, a historian at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tymoczko, Julianna Living people 1975 births 21st-century American mathematicians American women mathematicians Harvard College alumni Princeton University alumni University of Iowa faculty Smith College faculty Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Mathematicians from Massachusetts 21st-century American women