The Department of Mathematics has multiple research projects going on in various domains at present. The English Press Club spoke to the Head of Department, Prof. Balram Dubey, about the current research areas of the department, and its plans for the future.

At present, the Department of Mathematics consists of 18 faculty members, and 19 research scholars. Of these research scholars, 6 receive their fellowship grants from the institute, whereas the other 13 receive their grants from government sources (the Department of Science and Technology, and the University Grants Commission). The areas of research span algebra, analysis, mathematical modelling, operations research, numerical solutions of differential equations, and computational fluid dynamics.

In the past three years, the Department of Mathematics has published 57 papers in reputed journals, in addition to 8 papers in conference proceedings and book chapters. These papers are often interdisciplinary – overlapping with fields like biology, astrophysics, mechanical engineering, and computer science. Application of mathematical models is an area of increasing interest, as these models can have vast contributions in predicting real world systems, such as virus dynamics and biological populations.

In the past four years there have been 8 government funded projects, out of which two have recently finished. The sum total of external (government) funding on ongoing projects is 1.78 crore rupees. BITS also provides between two and ten lakhs to new faculty in the department, to get their research up and running. At present, there are 5 institute funded projects going on with a combined funding of 16.95 lakh rupees.

This money is spent in many ways – it is given to students as scholarship, and to the department for buying books. It is allocated towards the various requirements for each project separately. Money also goes to computation, software, and other miscellaneous expenditures. There is one computation lab that is 100% supported by UGC and DST. This is utilised frequently by research students.

Undergraduate students have not been very inclined towards research, but they are learning the basics, through Study Oriented Projects and First Degree Theses. However, these papers are not often published in journals. Only two UG students have published papers in high quality journals in recent years.

To increase the involvement of undergraduate students in research, the department encourages theses, since that option provides a full semester for work to be done. Study Oriented Projects tend to be inadequate because students often lack the time, as they are caught up with other courses.

As far as future plans are concerned, Prof. Dubey stated that the department is planning to increase the number of research students taken in. However, he stated that student quality and interest is key to maximizing research output. Prof. Dubey also expressed his satisfaction with the current batch of PhD students, stating that the work their is going exceptionally well.