Jianyu MA

This semester was exciting but also depressing due to Covid-19. New classmates were competitive and I enjoyed this motivated study atmosphere.

I made few new friends and met three old classmates from Wuhan University this year. We shared similar interest in mathematics. This was much better then before since some discussions were available.

• Our first semester began offline but turned into online meetings after November. This was really a disastrous situation for me. I had lots of problem in focusing on my study since I would spend all my day doing programming stuff. This had no good to me, I became obsessive and distracted. I wasted a lot of time, and I learnt almost nothing when staying at my 9m² room. As for study, most of time I was trying to catch up course process by reading reference books. Some of them are interesing:
  1. Peter Petersen: Riemannian Geometry, ISBN: 978-3-319-26652-7
  2. S.R.Novikov V.A.Rokhlin (Eds.): Topology II, ISBN: 978-3-642-08084-5
  3. Alan F.Beardon: Iteration of Rational Functions, ISBN: 978-0-387-95151-5

  I didn’t get a good mark for exams and hence dropped into deep self-doubt. And I tried hard to think over whether I should do a PhD. Finally I came to conclusion that without mathematics my life will be less tolerable and I shouldn’t stop just due to the fear for unknown difficulties.

  Another thing I needed to decide is my M2 internship topic. Firstly I tried hyperbolic geometry, then machine learning and finally optimal transport. Working with probability theory (measure theory) and geometry seemed nice and interesting enough to me. From my view point, they are good examples in mathematics that connect abstraction and intuition closely and this is where mathematics reveals its beauty.

• The second semester began with online courses, and I was still not used to this mode of study. I didn’t finish any reference books yet so apparently I could work harder.

This was my first time to live abroad, life was beautiful but lonely and I missed my friends in China a lot. The loneness helped me focus on mathematics but also hurt.

There was an amazing math library with a basement, I enjoyed working underground with a blackboard in front.

• For the first semester, I followed these courses: functional analysis, algebra, probability, differential geometry and distribution. I had learnt most of them in Wuhan University as bachelor courses, so I followed some books talking about advanced topics, which are challenging enough for me to avoid the boredom out of repetition :
  1. Walter Rudin: Functional Analysis, ISBN: 978-0-0706-1988-3
  2. Serge Lang: Algebra, ISBN: 978-1-4612-6551-1
  3. E. T. Jaynes: Probability Theory: The Logic of Science, ISBN: 978-0-5215-9271-0
• For the second semester, I followed mathematics modelling, commutative algebra, topology, probability-statistics, and English. Our courses stopped at the middle of March because of the Covid-19 pandemic and I had no interest in attending any online courses. I was inefficient and learnt very little. Stressful at the beginning of pandemic and lonely at the end of this semester. I spent weeks on all other things except maths, such as program reverse engineering, music, website design, philosophy and psychology. Fortunately, I finally could sit down and learn geometry. Math is peace to me. I enjoyed following textbook:
  1. Glen E. Bredon: Topology and Geometry, ISBN: 978-1-4419-3103-0
  2. John M. Lee: Introduction to Smooth Manifolds, ISBN: 978-1-4419-9981-8
  3. John W. Milnor: Topology from the Differentiable Viewpoint, ISBN: 978-0-6910-4833-8
  4. Daniel Revuz & Marc Yor: Continuous Martingales and Brownian Motion, ISBN: 978-3-642-08400-3

As for Master 2, I got a ten-month scholarship from CIMI.

The confusion about values led me explore more about philosophy. Thanks to the loose schedule of our mathematical department, I could save time for reading something about Nietzsche and Foucault.

Like most apprentices, I am interested in many areas of mathematics, such as algebra, geometry, probability, and logic. Although in the end, most students need to choose only one topic that interests them in order to become an expert in that field, learning different fields is still a worthwhile adventure.

College life was colorful, and my experience had greatly enriched. I have tried interviewing rural teachers, writing mobile software and making short films; they were precious memories of my college life.

• In the last year, I received a five-month scholarship from CSC to study at Toulouse, France. Finally I used the internship report mentioned in the Research part of this page as my undergraduate design. Due to Covid-19, CSC committee changed the returning policy for students abroad so I stayed in France for a whole summer.
• In the third year, I took French courses on weekends, but not a hardworking student. I did a part-time job tutoring some college students with math. When I completed all the credits, my GPA reached 3.93/4.0, ranking second in my department.
• In the second year, I transferred to the Department of Mathematics. I was passionate about mathematics and got attentions from some teachers.
• In the first year, I majored in computer science. I was not very interested in this subject and even spent more time on math.

Having made more friends and read books in different categories, I developed a broad interest in science. Campus life taught me a lot about courage, caution, selflessness and diligence.

No longer being the best student in my class and I taught myself a bit more math. But unexpectedly, I didn’t do well in the math part of National College Entrance Examination. Here is the homepage.

It permitted me a wonderful childhood with not many homework assignments but many lovely teachers. English teacher Mr. Tong helped me get rid of school bullying.

In this rural independent school, I ranked first among 39 classmates; and the scholarship from it eased my financial difficulties. At that time, doing mathematical exercises satisfied me a lot and some teachers had creative solutions to them.