Any suggestions for my final decision? I am interested in number theory

Forum for the GRE subject test in mathematics.
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NumberTheory
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2016 8:07 pm

Any suggestions for my final decision? I am interested in number theory

Post by NumberTheory » Sun Mar 27, 2016 8:27 pm

Hello everyone.
I applied to 20 mathematics PhD programs and now I think it's time for choice and decision. My interested area is number theory, including analytic number theory, algebraic number theory and arithmetic geometry. But I think it's unrealistic to master so much in only five to six years. so perhaps I will prefer something analytic first which is I am better at. But it would also be great that if the department is quite strong in algebraic aspect of number theory, in which case I will try to learn more algebraic things.
My offers are: Johns Hopkins, Maryland, Rutgers, Stony Brook, Penn State, CUNY
If possible, could you possible rank the six departments by their strength in number theory?
I know the USNEWS ranking and the ranking for algebra/algebraic geometry/number theory, but it seems there is no ranking for number theory only. I will appreciate it very much if you could tell me which part of number theory is each department better at and your suggestion which one I should attend.
Thank you very much.

UsernameMath
Posts: 6
Joined: Wed Dec 30, 2015 12:59 pm

Re: Any suggestions for my final decision? I am interested in number theory

Post by UsernameMath » Mon Mar 28, 2016 9:58 am

Try looking up the faculty interests as well as the courses offered on the website.
I personally learned a lot from looking at the course work at each school. I was a little bit surprised at how it differs a lot by school.
If you have a specific research ideas and faculty you want to work with, go with that, but if you just have a general interest in the area,
and are waiting to find out a specific research direction, than I think picking the school with generous amount of courses offered in that area will be better.
Disclaimer: I am an applicant this year, so I don't really know much. I am just making speculations and just wanted to share what I learned.

joga
Posts: 24
Joined: Sat Apr 04, 2015 2:21 pm

Re: Any suggestions for my final decision? I am interested in number theory

Post by joga » Wed Mar 30, 2016 12:23 pm

First of all congratulations on your admits. My few words

Given your interests I believe Rutgers seems to the best option! It has Henryk Iwaniec, possibly one of the best analytic number theorists the world has. Given that you should talk to him about being possible advisor. Also Tunnell and Kontorovich. Apart from the Rutgers has a strong algebra group and is close to Princeton as well as NYU and Columbia if you will.
I can't emphasize enough - rankings only matter to a point.

While I was a PhD student at NYU, I learnt Algebraic Geometry at columbia and there is some good interaction between the schools.

Also Rutgers has Mamouns - Shawarma and Falafel which is yummy!!!!!

Sony-SB has an amazing geometry program, with Lazarsfeld, Starr, and Cataldo. Starr is pretty arithmetic but really is a geometric person!

Its important to remember that you are in an active place with possible interactions with other schools if you can have that.

Have fun wherever you join

NumberTheory
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Mar 27, 2016 8:07 pm

Re: Any suggestions for my final decision? I am interested in number theory

Post by NumberTheory » Sat Apr 02, 2016 10:29 pm

Thank you very much for your suggestion. It's very helpful. Perhaps Johns Hopkins and Stony Brook are no longer in my list since there are not many people doing number theory. More people at Cuny do number theory but I doubt whether it's very strong. From the departments' websites, there are quite a lot people at U Maryland and PSU doing algebraic number theory or arithmetic geometry, but I am not sure how strong they are.

Since I don't how to judge a professor's work, could you give me any advice for this? From their numbers of citations, journals of publications or anything else to roughly estimate how strong a number theory group in some university is?

Thanks.


joga wrote:First of all congratulations on your admits. My few words

Given your interests I believe Rutgers seems to the best option! It has Henryk Iwaniec, possibly one of the best analytic number theorists the world has. Given that you should talk to him about being possible advisor. Also Tunnell and Kontorovich. Apart from the Rutgers has a strong algebra group and is close to Princeton as well as NYU and Columbia if you will.
I can't emphasize enough - rankings only matter to a point.

While I was a PhD student at NYU, I learnt Algebraic Geometry at columbia and there is some good interaction between the schools.

Also Rutgers has Mamouns - Shawarma and Falafel which is yummy!!!!!

Sony-SB has an amazing geometry program, with Lazarsfeld, Starr, and Cataldo. Starr is pretty arithmetic but really is a geometric person!

Its important to remember that you are in an active place with possible interactions with other schools if you can have that.

Have fun wherever you join



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