Applied Calculus

In this course, we go beyond the calculus textbook, working with practitioners in social, life and physical sciences to understand how calculus and mathematical models play a role in their work.

Through a series of case studies, you’ll learn:

• How standardized test makers use functions to analyze the difficulty of test questions;
• How economists model interaction of price and demand using rates of change, in a historical case of subway ridership;
• How an x-ray is different from a CT-scan, and what this has to do with integrals;
• How biologists use differential equation models to predict when populations will experience dramatic changes, such as extinction or outbreaks;
• How the Lotka-Volterra predator-prey model was created to answer a biological puzzle;
• How statisticians use functions to model data, like income distributions, and how integrals measure chance;
• How Einstein’s Energy Equation, E=mc2 is an approximation to a more complicated equation.