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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link="#0563C1" vlink="#954F72"><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif'>Dear All,<br><br>Guy Moshkovitz and Daniel Litt are organizing a working group this semester aimed at discussing <b>elementary</b> problems accessible to a general mathematical audience, loosely inspired by the Polymath projects. It's called the BYOP@Lunch Working Group (<b>B</b>ring <b>Y</b>our <b>O</b>wn <b>P</b>roblem).<br><br>The idea is to have each week 2-3 problems presented by participants, followed by a vote on which to discuss, followed by a 45-minute long discussion. The atmosphere of the working group is meant to be warm, casual, and friendly.<br><br>Meetings will be held on <b>Wednesdays at 12:30pm</b> in the <b>Dilworth room</b>, starting Wednesday, January 23. Just grab some lunch from the cafeteria and join.<br><br>Please send an email to </span><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><a href="mailto:byoplunch@googlegroups.com" target="_blank"><span style='font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#4285F4'>byoplunch@googlegroups.com</span></a></span><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif'> if you are interested in attending and would like to be included in the mailing list.<br><br><br><br><b>*Format of the seminar*</b><br><br>If you have a problem you think would be interesting to discuss, please send it to </span><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><a href="mailto:byoplunch@googlegroups.com" target="_blank"><span style='font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#4285F4'>byoplunch@googlegroups.com</span></a></span><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif'> by Tuesday, January 22. Problems should be <b>elementary</b>: that is, understandable by a broad audience. Any background necessary should fit into a 5-minute mini-presentation at the blackboard. They should not be difficult open problems, and need not have a precise statement. The goal need not be to solve a problem in its entirety; for example, we can focus on an interesting, concrete special case. And it's alright if you're not an expert on the problem you are proposing; just do a brief google search to make sure it's not a famous open problem.<br><br>Before each meeting, the organizers will pick two or three of the problems proposed by email, and their proposers will be asked to prepare a (very casual) 5-minute presentation of the problem, including necessary background and motivation. After a quick vote, we will transition to a discussion of the proposed problem.<br><br>If you'd like to propose a problem, please send a 1-2 paragraph email to <a href="mailto:byoplunch@googlegroups.com" target="_blank"><span style='color:#4285F4'>byoplunch@googlegroups.com</span></a> with an explanation and motivation, as well as references if they exist. Neither the email nor the resulting 5 minute presentation needs to be polished.<br><br>Sources of problems that might fit the seminar include: self-contained questions arising from your research, elementary problems you are idly curious about, attempts to improve an existing short paper/result, attempts to find a clean proof of existing results with complicated proofs, and the construction of interesting examples or special cases.<br><br>Ultimately, the goal of the seminar is to have a nice chat and discover some new mathematics -- of course, if a nice paper or two comes out of it, that would be great.<br><br>Hope to see you there,<br>Guy Moshkovitz and Daniel Litt</span><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div></body></html>