Daniel Appelö was recently hired as associate professor in the Applied Mathematics department at the University of Colorado Boulder. Originally from Sweden, he was drawn to Colorado because of its natural beauty and culture. He also admired CU for its prestigious numerical analysis program.
He is excited to be joining the faculty in their mission of higher education and he feels like it is a great fit for him. Appelö was originally supposed to take a sabbatical this year, but felt like he would have been missing out on the amazing opportunities that his current position offered.
This semester, he is teaching an introductory course in numerical analysis. Since CU is also known for high order methods and its impact on "national laboratory problems”, he hopes to be interacting with this subject more in the future. “My core interest is high order accurate numerical methods that can be used for applications in science and engineering. However I always get excited about problems where I feel that I can contribute by designing better computational methods enabling new problems to be solved or new science to be discovered. What makes it so fun to go to work every day is that in academia we have, in the words of Feynman, the opportunity to experience ‘the pleasure of finding things out’,” he said.
He hopes that his future students will understand, that although classwork and focus on their major is important, it is also important to be a well rounded individual. Appelö encourages students to attend other events sponsored by the apartment, like guest lectures and research seminars that might not be directly related to their field.
“I was fortunate in that my mentors were skilled researchers and teachers as well as ‘whole human beings’ capable of giving advice on a wide range of topics. Most of the graduates from APPM will end up as leaders and mentors, be it in a scientific field or elsewhere, and I therefore think it is important to have a skillset that covers more than the technical aspects of being a PhD in Applied Mathematics,” said Appelö.