New Faces in the Graduate Faculty: Tom Needham

In January of 2019, Dr. Tom Needham walked into the Love Building to give a talk on topology in data science at FSU’s Mathematics Colloquium. Less than nine months later, he walked into the same building to teach his first full day of classes as an Assistant Professor. As the newest professor within the Department of Mathematics, Dr. Needham brings a background of data science research and signal processing applications to the university.

Journey to Florida State

Before coming to Tallahassee, Tom started his undergraduate studies in mathematics at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, graduating twice from the school: once in 2007 for a Bachelor of Science in Applied Math and Physics, and again, in 2009, for a Master of Science in Mathematics. Following his time in Wisconsin, Tom traveled south to attend the University of Georgia. Here, he earned his PhD in Mathematics, and wrote his thesis titled, “Grassmannian geometry of framed curve spaces.” While working on his PhD, Tom also began his teaching career by serving as a Teaching Assistant for six years.

Following his graduation, Tom was hired by The Ohio State University as a Ross Assistant Professor. At Ohio State, he taught courses such as General Topology and Knot Theory and Calculus. Additionally, he created and established Introduction to Applied Algebraic Topology, an undergraduate course focused on persistence homology.

In the Fall of 2019, Tom joined the Department of Mathematics at Florida State University as an Assistant Professor. During his first semester, he enjoyed being able to work with FSU students for the first time through his Calculus III course. “The class went smoothly and I had some very bright students,” he said. “My teaching experience in the first semester was great.”

A Focus on Data Science

Outside of the classroom, Tom is a part of the budding data science research taking place at FSU. As stated in the 2018 “Data Never Sleeps” report by Domo, a cloud-based business management platform, it was estimated that “1.7 megabytes of data will be created every second for every person on earth” in the year 2020. With 2.5 quintillion bytes of data being created every day, data science has become essential to understand for researchers. For Tom, this understanding will come from mathematics and statistics. “Data science is a vital area in mathematics because methods of data science have been very successful from a practical viewpoint, but the theory of why they work is still not well understood,” he said. “In order for advanced methods of data science to be more widely adopted in, say, medical diagnostics, we need a better theoretical understanding of them.”

With new programs and projects starting up, Tom and a number of his peers are working to explain the theory of data science through mathematics. “FSU has strong groups working in the theory of data science from many perspectives,” he said. In addition to their research, Tom and his peers are teaming up with the Department of Computer Science and Department of Statistics, to develop a Master’s Degree Program in Data Science.

Tom has also worked on using data science for specific applications outside of FSU. Last summer, he joined a group of mathematicians at The Institute for Computational and Experimental Research in Mathematics at Brown University, to look into gun violence through a mathematical lens. “We are currently working on developing a mathematical model to explain the increase in mass shooting incidents in recent years.” This is just one example of how Tom’s research provides data science applications.

Aside from data science, Tom has been focusing his attention on a number of research projects. For example, he is looking into Network Analysis through Optimal Transport with his collaborator, Samir Chowdhury, of Stanford University. This area of mathematics examines the most effective way to allocate resources. “The goal of this project is to use ideas from OT to compare networks, such as social networks or neural networks,” Tom said. “It turns out that the Optimal Transport formulation of network analysis has many convenient properties, allowing us to define statistical quantities for collection of networks. For example, given a collection of social networks, how should one define the ‘average’ social network?” Tom and his collaborator answer this question through their work. Furthermore, he is studying Symplectic Geometry and Signal Processing. “It turns out that symplectic geometry has surprising applications to problems in signal processing,” he said. “My collaborator, Clayton Shonkwiler [of Colorado State University], and I discovered that problems in signal processing can frequently be reformulated in the language of symplectic geometry, which gives a new set of tools for tackling them.”

Looking Ahead

In addition to his research, Tom is currently organizing an international workshop to take place this summer. The workshop, set to take place at the Mathematical Biosciences Institute at The Ohio State University, will focus on bringing researchers together “from the disciplines of optimal transport and topological data analysis to discuss application domains which are commonly studied in both fields.” During the summer, he will also speak at the 2020 SIAM Conference on Mathematics of Data Science.

Despite only being in Tallahassee for a semester so far, Tom is already beginning to leave several lasting impacts within the math department. With new programs, courses, conferences, and research projects in the works, he is looking forward to what his first year at FSU will hold. For Tom, FSU’s Department of Mathematics is set apart from others across the country because it provides students and faculty alike with inclusivity and a friendly atmosphere. “In many math departments, there is not very much interaction between different research groups or between senior and junior faculty,” he said. “At FSU, there are frequent events where faculty from several disciplines and seniority levels get together. At larger events, there is also a lot of interaction with postdocs and graduate students.” Feeling welcomed in his new environment, Tom is grateful to call Florida State home and is excited for what his time within the math department will bring.