Last updated in . Get the latest version at johndcobb.github.io/cv/.
Print

John D. Cobb
jdcobb3@gmail.com https://github.com/johndcobb johndcobb
Research Interests: Algebraic geometry, commutative algebra, and their applications to data science.

Employment

2024–

Auburn University
nsf postdoctoral research fellow

Auburn, AL

Sponsor: Hal Schenck.

Education

2019–2024

University of Wisconsin-Madison
ph.d. mathematics

Madison, WI

Advisors: Daniel Erman, Michael Kemeny.

2015–2019

Honors College of Charleston
b.s. mathematics, b.a. chemistry, minor data science

Charleston, SC

Awards & Grants

2025 NSF conference grant DMS-2504328 ($20,767)
Awarded to fund MAAG 2025 in Auburn.
2024 NSF conference grant DMS-2408333 ($16,255)
Awarded to fund US participation in the 31st edition of GAeL.
2024 NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship DMS-2402199 ($190,000)
2023 NSF conference grant DMS-2309424 ($15,833)
Awarded to fund US participation in the 30th edition of GAeL.
2023 Exceptional Service Award, UW Madison Mathematics Department
Awarded to 3/120 Math Department Teaching Assistants.
2021 First Place for Early Stage ($3,500), Transcend Madison Competition
Project Article
For a prototype website for making academic preprints on arXiv more accessible and searchable.
2019 Alternate Candidate, Fulbright
2019 Outstanding Student in Computational Chemistry, American Chemical Society
To one graduating senior in the Chemistry Department.
2019 Ewa Wojcicka Mathematics Award, Math Department, College of Charleston
College of Charlestons math departments top award.
2019 Phi Kappa Phi Fellowship ($8,500)
2019 NDSEG Fellowship ($130,000), Air Force Office of Scientific Research
2018 Gadsden Scholarship, Math Department, College of Charleston
2018 Horatio Hughes Scholarship in Mathematics, Math Department, College of Charleston
2018 Brewer Scholarship, Chemistry Department, College of Charleston
2018 Scott Ward Award, Math Department, College of Charleston
Article
2017 Goldwater Scholarship, Barry Goldwater Scholarship Foundation
Article
The premier undergraduate award in STEM.

Papers [Interactive Version]

Journal

J4

Syzygies of Curves in Products of Projective Spaces

John Cobb. Mathematische Zeitschrift, 2023.
J3

Virtual Criterion for Generalized Eagon-Northcott Complexes

Caitlyn Booms, John Cobb. Journal of Pure and Applied Algebra, 2021.
J2

Quarternion-Valued Breather Soliton, Rational, and Periodic QKdV Solutions

John Cobb, Alex Kasman, Albert Serna, Monique Sparkman. Journal of Nonlinear Mathematical Physics, 2020.
J1

Aggregate Dispersions to Enhance the Intrachain Order in Surfactant-Stabilized Aqueous Colloids of Poly(3-hexylthiophene)

McKenna Andrews, Anna Smirnova, Devin Sharp, Sarah Taylor, John Cobb, David Boucher. Journal of Molecular Liquids, 2019.

Preprint

P4

LikelihoodGeometry: Macaulay2 package

David Barnhill, John Cobb, Matthew Faust. Submitted, 2024.
P3

Multigraded Stillman's Conjecture

John Cobb, Nathaniel Gallup, John Spoerl. Submitted, 2024.
P2

Likelihood Correspondence of Toric Statistical Models

David Barnhill, John Cobb, Matthew Faust. Submitted, 2023.
P1

Extending Transductive Knowledge Graph Embedding Models for Inductive Logical Relational Inference

Thomas Gebhart, John Cobb. Submitted, 2023.

Talks [Interactive Version]

Conference

AMS Spring Southeastern Sectional Meeting, Clemson, SC
TX-LA SIAM Mini-Symposium on Nonlinear Algebra in Applications, Waco, TX
AMS Special Session on Topics in Commutative Algebra and Algebraic Geometry (cancelled), Savannah, GA
URiCA (Upcoming researchers in Commutative Algebra) 2024, Lincoln, NE
AMS Special Session on Homological Methods in Commutative Algebra and Algebraic Geometry, San Francisco, CA
JMM Special Session on Recent Developments in Commutative Algebra, San Francisco, CA
JMM Special Session on Commutative Algebra and Algebraic Geometry, San Francisco, CA
Algebra Days at ASU, Tempe, AZ
Institute of Mathematical and Statistical Innovation, Chicago, IL
AG23 SIAM Mini-Symposium on Castelnuovo-Mumford Regularity and Applications, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
AMS Special Session on Building Bridges Between Commutative Algebra and Nearby Areas, Salt Lake City, UT
AMS Contributed Paper Session on Partial Differential Equations, Baltimore, MD

Seminar

Auburn Algebra Seminar, Auburn, AL
Georgia Tech Algebra Seminar, Atlanta, GA
UW Madison Algebra and Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
Iowa State University Algebra and Geometry Seminar, Ames, IA
ACMD Seminar (NIST), Boulder, CO
UW Madison Graduate Applied Math Seminar, Madison, WI
Center for Computing Sciences, Bowie, MD
Center for Communications Research, Princeton, NJ
UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
University of Hawaii-Manoa, Manoa, HI
UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
Center for Computing Sciences, Bowie, MD
UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
UW Madison AMS Student Chapter Seminar, Madison, WI
UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI

Poster

GAeL XXIX, Orsay, France
Western Algebraic Geometry Symposium, Riverside, CA
Western Algebraic Geometry Symposium, Fort Collins, CO
JMM Undergraduate Poster Session, Baltimore, MD

Outreach

Madison Math Circle, Madison, WI
Delta Beer Lab, Madison, WI
Data Science Club, Charleston, SC
Data Science Club, Charleston, SC

Teaching

MATH 217: Calculus with Algebra & Trig II

Spring 2024
Teaching Assistant. Hold weekly problem solving sessions and office hours. UW Madison

MATH 222: Calculus II

Fall 2023
Head Teaching Assistant. Hold weekly problem solving sessions and office hours. Create worksheets and quizzes, organize all other TA's teaching the course. UW Madison

Galin Education

Aug 2022 – Sep 2023
Academic Tutor. Meet with students weekly one on one to help with college level math courses. Madison, WI

MATH 234: Calculus III

Spring 2023
Fall 2022
Teaching Assistant. Hold weekly problem solving sessions and office hours. UW Madison

MATH 221: Calculus I

Fall 2021
Fall 2020
Teaching Assistant. Hold weekly problem solving sessions. UW Madison

MATH 229: Vector Calculus with Chemical Applications

Spring 2019
Fall 2018
Spring 2018
Fall 2017
Teaching Assistant. Presented new content and held problem sessions. College of Charleston

Organizing

Conferences & Seminars

Apr 2025 MAAG 2025, Auburn, AL
Website
Dec 2024 NZMS/AusMS/AMS Special Session on Computations and Applications of AG and CA, Auckland, NZ
Website
Jun 2024 GAeL XXXI, Turin, Italy
Website
Jul 2023 GAeL XXX, Coventry, UK
Website
Fall 2021 – Spring 2024 UW Madison Graduate Algebraic Geometry Seminar, Madison, WI
Website

Reading Groups

Spring 2023 3264 and all that, Madison, WI
Website
Spring 2022 Positivity in Algebraic Geometry, Madison, WI
Website
Summer 2020 Geometry of Schemes, Madison, WI
Website
Summer 2021 The Rising Sea, Madison, WI
Website

Service & Outreach

Panelist for Organizing Conferences Aimed at Graduate Students

Spring 2024 Panelist on a discussion about organizing conferences held by the UW Madison math department. Madison, WI

Mentor at UW Madison Directed Reading Program

Spring 2024 Led a group of students in reading Stillwell's "Mathematics and its History". Madison, WI

Organizer at UW Madison Directed Reading Program

Fall 2019–Fall 2023 The DRP is a math mentoring program that pairs undergraduate students with graduate student mentors, for a semester-long independent study project. Madison, WI

Graduate Mentor at MXM Experimental Mathematics project

Fall 2022, Spring 2023 Directed advanced undergraduates on a computationally focused research project concerning identifiable linear compartmental models. Madison, WI

Graduate Mentor at Undergraduate Mentoring Program

Fall 2022 Met with a group of undergraduate math majors to give advice about how to navigate their undergrad degree, plan for grad school apps, and think about REUs and other opportunities. Madison, WI

Math Meet Coordinator at UW Madison

Spring 2022 Wrote problems and planned a math competition for over 200 middle schoolers around Wisconsin. Madison, WI

Public Service Fellow at WISCIENCE

Jan 2021–Jan 2022 Met and discussed best ways to engage with the public and worked with a community partner on a web project to make arXiv easier to navigate. Madison, WI

Mentor at First Generation Student Success

Fall 2020–Spring 2021 FGSS links first-generation college students to first generation graduate and faculty mentors for monthly meetings. Madison, WI

Volunteer Tutor at Trident Literacy Association

Oct 2015–Oct 2016 Helped weekly to prepare nontraditional students for their GED. Charleston, SC

Cofounder & Board Member at The Cancer Chase

Feb 2015–Oct 2017 Helped direct an annual 5k run benefiting Carolinas HealthCare System's Levine Cancer Institute. Rallied support from local businesses to raise over $15,000 annually. Fort Mill, SC

Referee Work

Proceedings of the American Mathematical Society, Advances in Applied Mathematics, Journal of Symbolic Computation

Work Experience

Data Science Intern at Tresata

Jul 2017–Aug 2017

Invited by Chief Analyst Dr. Tim Chartier to rewrite prospective rankability measures (primarily using Apache spark) to fit the memory partitioning schemes of computer clusters.

 Charlotte, NC

Mentor: Tim Chartier


Student Researcher at Institute on Graph Analytics and Research in Data Science

Dec 2016–May 2019

Designed algorithms to calculate suspected indicators of how ”rankable” a dataset is by virtue of its spectral properties.

 Charleston, SC

Mentors: Paul Anderson, Amy Langville

Programming

Experienced: Python, Macaulay2
Familiar: Java, MySQL, PyTorch, pandas, numpy
Beginner: Scikit-learn, MATLAB, Mathematica