Erika Roldan Roa

Erika Roldán Roa is a mathematician with academic affiliations at Ohio State University (Visiting Assistant Professor, 2019-2020) and Technische Universität München (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow, 2020-2022). She holds a Ph.D. in Probability and Statistics from CIMAT (2018) and has conducted postdoctoral research at institutions like EPFL and Ohio State. Her work bridges stochastic topology, combinatorics, and educational technology, focusing on topics like cubical sliding puzzles, Eden growth models, and extremal topological problems in polyominoes.

Education:

• Ph.D. in Probability and Statistics, CIMAT (2018)
• M.Sc. in Mathematics, CIMAT (2014)
• B.Sc. in Mathematics, Universidad de Guanajuato (2010)

Research Interests: Her research spans stochastic topology, extremal combinatorics, and applications of discrete geometry to puzzles and games. She explores configuration spaces, topological properties of random structures, and innovative educational approaches like the Music Math Project, which integrates music and mathematics.

Awards: Includes the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship (2020-2022), Arana-Ordaz Prize (2019), and Sofia Kovalevskaia Prize (2019). She has also received grants from CONACYT and CIMAT.

Grants & Outreach: Developed workshops in marginalized communities using music and math, and contributed to software tools like the Eden Model analysis package. Active in science popularization through articles and outreach programs.

Labs/Teams: Collaborated on projects like the Eden Model (topology analysis software) and extremal animal configurations, often involving interdisciplinary teams in mathematics and computer science.