Harald Bohr Lecture: Persi Diaconis (Stanford University)
Title: Adding Numbers and Shuffling Cards
Speaker: Persi Diaconis (Mary V. Sunseri Professor of Statistics and Mathematics), Stanford University
Abstract: When numbers are added in the usual manner, "carries" occur along the way. It turns out that the carries form a Markov chain with an "amazing" transition matrix.
This same matrix occurs in the analysis of the usual method of riffle shuffling cards (the seven shuffles theorem), in character theory, sections of generating functions, and elsewhere.
These connections say new things about adding numbers. I will explain all of the terms above to a general mathematical audience.