DREU 2009 Ioana Bercea

I am a rising fourth year at the University of Chicago, Class of 2010. I am majoring in Mathematics and Computer Science. My research interestes include Theoretical Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence.(Computer Vision, Computational Biology, Computational Neuroscience) I am interested in using my Mathematical training and developing new algorithms using Discrete Mathematics, Combinatorics.

I came to the United States for college, after finishing highschool in Romania. In 5th grade, I started going to Mathematical Olympiads. Consistently throughout my career, I was part of intercounty and national teams. In the meantime, I attended a Computer Science highschool in which I studied C/C++ for three years and took other CS classes.

I enjoy travelling a lot, though it has become a little bit of tiresome lately. It all started with making the big jump across the ocean, and since then, I have been jumping oceans a lot. :) My most memorable experience was travelling in Africa for a month during Winter break. I visited South Africa(Cape Town and Johannesburg), Botswana(Gaborone and the Okavango Delta), Zambia(Victoria Falls) and Namibia(Windhoek, Walvis Bay, Swakopmund). Before coming to Blacksburg, I studied for a quarter in Paris, with UChicago's Advanced Mathematics program. I also enjoy travelling for shorther periods of time, one of my favorite places being Vienna.

Apart from travelling, I also enjoy reading and discovering beautiful things in the world(like a new painter, or a new singer/composer, or even just an interesting view from my window). Recently, I have started cooking and right now, I am discovering new methods to marinate meat, ha ha.