Mathematics
The focus of my research is on the combinatorics of arrangements of hyperplanes, and in particular on its connection with the topology of the arrangement’s complement.
My background is the study of mathematics with special focus on theoretical computer science at ETH Zurich, followed by a diploma thesis on ‘complex’ oriented matroids and a PhD thesis on the topology and combinatorics of arrangement covers and of nested set complexes. Both theses were supervised by my advisor, prof. Eva-Maria Feichtner.
After the PhD I spent a year at the university of Pisa in the group of prof. Mario Salvetti, founded by the Swiss National Science Foundation. Then, I was granted a postdoctoral position at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute of Berkeley, CA. I am now visiting assistant professor at Binghamton university (State University of New York).
I wish that anyone could appreciate a glimpse of the beauty of mathematics, even whitout having to spend years to aquire the technical ability to actually do math. I try to do a small contribution in this sense by maintaining a sort of blog about “coffee and mathematics“.
For similar reasons I recently became interested also in mathematics education. Since I have no formal training in this area, I try to learn from teaching experience and from contact with teachers and experts.