Summer 2005 Program
Research Experience for Undergraduates
The Mathematics of Games of Chance
June 6--July 15, 2005
University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah
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For more information, including
applications, visit:
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February 28, 2005
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Applicants will receive
notification of acceptance by:
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February 15, 2005
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Applications are due by:
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Berton Earnshaw
Larsen Louder
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Graduate Assistants:
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Robert Hannum
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Guest Lecturer:
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David Levin
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Co-organizer:
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Stewart Ethier
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Principal Lecturer:
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Applied topics will include slot machines,
roulette, keno, craps, faro, baccarat, trente et
quarante, blackjack, video poker (Jacks or
Better, Deuces Wild), house-banked poker
(Three-Card Poker, Let It Ride, Carribean
Stud), and poker (seven-card stud, Texas hold
'em).
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Theoretical topics will include house advantage,
gambler's ruin formulas, martingales, betting
systems, conservation of fairness, game theory,
utility functions, bold play, proportional betting,
shuffling, dealing, and card counting.
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This REU summer program, intended for undergraduate students
who have already completed a one-semester course in probability
(or the equivalent), will be concerned with the mathematical
aspects of casino gambling and specific games of chance.
Financial support is available for United
States citizens, nationals, or permanent
residents.
Participants will be paid a $2,000 stipend.
Out-of-state students will be reimbursed
$250 for travel expenses.
On-campus housing is available.
Students will be expected to complete a
research project on one of the topics. The
project may require computing. Computer
skills will be taught as needed.
As Louis Bachelier
wrote in 1914, "It is
almost always gambling that
enables one to form a fairly clear
idea of a manifestation of chance; it is
gambling that gave birth to the calculus of
probability; it is to gambling that this
calculus owes its first faltering utterances
and its most recent developments; it is
gambling that allows us to conceive of this
calculus in the most general way; it is,
therefore, gambling that one must strive
to understand, but one should
understand it in a philosophic
sense, free from all
vulgar ideas."
www.math.utah.edu/vigre/reu