Home Page for Jeff Dinitz

I am a Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Vermont in the great state of Vermont. I was the Department Chair for the Math Department from 1998 -- 2004 and I was also the Interim Chair of the Department of Computer Science at UVM from 2010--2012. The photo to the left was taken in February 2009 at Alpine Meadows Ski Area. That's Lake Tahoe in the background. To see the photo of me that was on this site from 1984 until 2000 click here.

My address, phone and fax number is given below.

Click for Burlington, Vermont Forcast

My mathematical interests

I am interested in computational and algebraic methods for determining the structure and existence of combinatorial configurations, such as designs and graphs. I am also interested in applications of combinatorial configurations to computer science and information theory and the design and analysis of combinatorial algorithms to find designs or label graphs.

I am the co editor-in-chief of the CRC Handbook of Combinatorial Designs (with Charlie Colbourn) and I maintain the web pages for the Handbook. Check it out. Click here for a photo of Charlie and me taken in Colorado in 1995 when we first showed a preliminary manuscript of the Handbook to people at the R.C. Bose Conference in Fort Collins. We are holding up the title page of the book.

I am also one of the editors-in-chief as well as the managing editor of the Journal of Combinatorial Designs.

More information on combinatorics is available from The Hyperbook of Combinatorics, the Combinatorics Net and The Electronic Journal of Combinatorics and World Combinatorics Exchange .

I am the co-director (with Sheila Weaver) of the Governor's Institute in Mathematical Sciences. This is a one week program for mathematically talented high school students. Information about the Institute can be found here. There was a nice article in the Burlington Free Press on June 26, 2008 about the Institute and another Free Press article on June 26, 2009.

Here is the web page for UVM - St. Mikes Applied Combinatorics Seminar.

In 2001, my colleague Dalibor Froncek and I were involved with the now defunct football league, the XFL. No, they didn't need me to be a player. We actually constructed the schedule of play for their 2001 season. Too bad the league folded after one year, they really liked our schedule and were planning on working with us again. At least we got to go to the championship game in Los Angeles and we got a lot of press for doing the schedule. Here is a photo of me and Dalibor in the LA Coliseum at the Championship game. The New York Times published an story about our scheduling the XFL, it appeared on Feb 3, 2001. (I saved it locally -- click here if you do not subscribe to the NY times online.) A similar article appeared in the sports page of the Burlington Free Press on Feb 11, 2001.

In some circles, I am most well known for posing the so called "Dinitz Conjecture". I made this conjecture to Paul Erdos in 1979 and it was eventually proven by Fred Galvin of the University of Kansas in 1994.

My other interests

I have a wife Sue and three kids, Mike (29) , Amy (27), and Tom (24). Sue teaches in the English Department at the University of Vermont and is currently the head of the Writing Center. Mike just got his Ph.D. in theoretical computer science at Carnegie-Mellon University (my alma mater:) and is in the third year of a post doc at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel , Amy is a resident in internal medicine at Tufts Medical Center in Boston and Tom is a graduate student in mathematics at The Ohio State University.

I enjoy sporting activities such as skiing, biking, sailing, kayaking, and hiking. My favorite ski area is Mad River Glen where I'm a shareholder. Here is a web page about how volunteers help maintain the famous woods trails at Mad River.

I am the faculty advisor to the UVM club football team -- Go Cats Go.

I am also a huge Ohio State Buckeyes football fan. (National Champions 2002 !! BCS finalist 2006 and 2007, undefeated 2012!) Click here , here or here for the latest information about the Buckeyes football team.

I also like my tractor. It's a Ford and I use it to plow snow in the winter and to mow the lawn in the summer. I have a few photos of me plowing my driveway during the snowy winter of 2000-2001. Click here or here to see the photos.

I have scanned in some pictures. Here is an index of the photos.

Available material

Address:

Jeff...@uvm.edu

Department of Mathematics and Statistics
University of Vermont
16 Colchester Ave.
Burlington, Vermont 05405
U.S.A.

My office is in 206 Mansfield House.

Telephone: 656-4292
Fax: (802) 656-2552

Back to the Math page: Click here.