My Dissertation

I did my Masters dissertation on computer-assisted probability modeling. I led a team that built a system comprised of multiple high-speed video cameras and a Cray mainframe computer. We painted a penny white on one side and black on the other. Then we would flip the penny and record its motions. While the penny was still mid-air, the computer would predict whether the penny would land heads (white) or tails (black).

Impressively, the computer had a 52% chance of being right, which is way better than weather modeling. Unfortunately it took 14 days after each coin landed for the computer to finish running the model. Plus, the faculty was biased against me out of jealousy. So I only got a C-.