
RSI math faculty advisors David Jerison and Ankur Moitra, program director Slava Gerovitch, and head mentor Tanya Khovanova with RSI-2019 students and mentors
Since 1993, the MIT Mathematics Department has participated in the Research Science Institute (RSI), an MIT-hosted six-week summer program for rising high school seniors. RSI students are chosen for their superior achievement in math, science and engineering. The selection for RSI is done by the Center for Excellence in Education, a federally and privately funded nonprofit organization, based in Washington DC. All inquiries about applications to RSI should be directed to the CEE.
There are about 3,000 applicants to the program each year and of the 80 selected, around one third are from abroad and two thirds from the United States. About a dozen students are selected to work on research projects in mathematics. The MIT Mathematics Department Faculty Advisors for RSI match each student with a mathematics graduate student mentor with compatible interests. The graduate student mentor devises a research project, often in consultation with an MIT faculty advisor. The graduate student then meets with each of his/her mentees each weekday during the RSI program. Dr. Slava Gerovitch is the program director.
The application materials and the process can be found online at CEE RSI application page .
At the end of the program, students make presentations to each other and to a panel of scientists who are usually former RSI participants themselves. See abstracts and papers from recent mathematics projects.
RSI students often use their projects to participate in the Intel Science Talent Search (Intel STS) and the Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology or the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (Intel ISEF). The mathematics group has been very well represented among the winners of these contests.
Yunseo Choi - USA Finalist and Gold Medalist 2020 Yau Science Award / Finalist Regeneron STS 2021 / Honorable Mention at 2021 MAA Undergraduate Poster Session
Mentor: Prof. Scott Duke Kominers (Harvard)
Andrei Mandelshtam - Finalist Regeneron STS 2021
Mentor: Daniil Kalinov
Dimitar Chakarov - Finalist ISEF-2020
Mentor: Yichi Zhang
Rupert Li - Finalist ISEF-2020
Mentor: Yibo Gao (PRIMES project)
Jason Liu - Finalist Regeneron STS 2020 / Davidson Fellow 2020
Mentor: Robert Burklund
AnaMaria Perez - Finalist ISEF-2020
Mentor: Rose Zhang
Kayson Hansen - Finalist ISEF-2019
Mentor: Hood Chatham
Kaiying Hou - Scholar Regeneron STS 2019
Mentor: Ruoxuan Yang
Aknazar Kazhymurat - Finalist ISEF-2019
Mentor: Bar Kartal
Chavdar Lalov - Third Award in Math from AMS at ISEF-2019
Mentor: Guangyi Yue
Kevin Liu - Scholar Regeneron STS 2019
Mentor: Chun Hong Lo
Roshan Warman - Finalist ISEF-2019
Mentor: Yibo Gao
Alan Peng - Semifinalist Siemens 2017 / Scholar Regeneron STS 2018
Mentor: Guangyi Yue
Michelle Shen - Semifinalist Siemens 2017 / Scholar Regeneron STS 2018
Mentor: Younhun Kim
Grace Tian - Semifinalist Siemens 2017 / Finalist Regeneron STS 2018
Mentor: Vishal Patil
David Wu - Semifinalist Siemens 2017 / Finalist Regeneron STS 2018 / Davidson Fellow 2018
Mentor: Robert Burklund
Karthik Yegnesh - Second Award in Math and AMS Honorable Mention ISEF 2018
Mentor: Augustus Lonergan
Benjamin Chen - Semifinalist Siemens 2016 / Scholar Regeneron STS 2017
Mentor: Thao Do
Angela Deng - Scholar Regeneron STS 2017
Mentor: Guangyi Yue
Caleb He - Semifinalist Siemens 2016
Mentor: Ethan Jaffe
Dona-Maria Ivanova - Fourth Award in Math ISEF 2017
Mentor: Zhenkun Li
Nolan Reilly - Semifinalist Siemens 2016
Mentor: Mason Biamonte
Dhruv Rohatgi - Semifinalist Siemens 2016 / Scholar Regeneron STS 2017
Mentor: Chiheon Kim
Amy Chou - Semifinalist Siemens 2015
Mentor: James Hirst
Brandon Epstein - Semifinalist Siemens 2015 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2016
Mentor: Hong Wang
Brian Gu - Semifinalist Siemens 2015
Mentor: Brandon Tran
Meena Jagadeesan - Semifinalist Siemens 2015
Mentor: Andrew Rzeznik
Abijith Krishnan - Semifinalist Siemens 2015
Mentor: Shan-Yuan Ho
Wilbur Li - Semifinalist Siemens 2015
Mentor: Cesar Cuenca
Sarvasva Raghuvanshi - Regional finalist Siemens 2015 / Outstanding Presentation at 2016 MAA Undergraduate Poster Session
Mentor: James Hirst
Kavish Gandhi - Semifinalist Intel STS 2015
Mentor: Chiheon Kim
Petar Gaydarov - Second Prize Intel ISEF 2015
Mentor: Sam Hopkins, project by Alexander Postnikov
Noah Golowich - First Place Medal Intel STS 2015 / Davidson Fellow Laureate
Mentor: David Rolnick, project by Jacob Fox
Lev Kendrick - Semifinalist Intel STS 2015
Mentor: Gus Lonergan, project by Pavel Etingof
Shashwat Kishore - Third Place Medal Intel STS 2015
Mentor: Gus Lonergan, project by Pavel Etingof
Yelena Mandelshtam - Semifinalist Siemens 2014 / Finalist Intel STS 2015
Mentor: Miriam Farber, project by Alexander Postnikov
Peter Tian - First Prize Siemens 2014 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2015 / Davidson Fellow
Mentor: Jesse Geneson, project by Jesse Geneson
Jesse Zhang Semifinalist Siemens 2014 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2015
Mentors: David Rush, project by Vic Reiner
Rumen Dangovski - Second Prize Intel ISEF 2014
Mentor: Nathan Harman, project by Pavel Etingof
Raj Raina - Semifinalist Siemens 2013 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2014
Mentor: Rik Sengupta, project by Jacob Fox
Sarah Shader - Semifinalist Siemens 2013 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2014 / Second Place AMS Menger Award at Intel ISEF 2014
Mentor: Gaku Liu, project by Alexander Postnikov
Jessica Shi - Semifinalist Siemens 2013 / Finalist Intel STS 2014 /
Outstanding Presentation at 2014 MAA Undergraduate Poster Session
Mentor: Francisco Unda, project by Jacob Fox
Bertrand Stone - Semifinalist Siemens 2013 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2014 / Honorable Mention for AMS Menger Award at Intel ISEF 2014
Mentor: Chiheon Kim, project by Pavel Etingof
Matthew Babbitt - Semifinalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Jesse Geneson
Surya Bhupatiraju - Finalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Alex Arkhipov
Joshua Brakensiek - Outstanding Presentation at 2013 MAA Undergraduate Poster Session / Davidson Fellow 2013 / 2013 MathFest Pi Mu Epsilon Student
Presentation Award
Semifinalist Siemens 2013 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2014
Mentor: Aaron Potechin
Katherine Cordwell - Finalist Intel STS 2013 / First Award Intel ISEF 2013
Mentor: Teng Fei
Kevin Garbe - Finalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Dorin Boger
Simanta Gautam - Semifinalist Siemens 2012 / Second Award Intel ISEF 2013
Mentor: Dmitry Vaintrob
Gil Goldshlager - Semifinalist Siemens 2012 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Aaron Potechin
Jacob McNamara - Semifinalist Siemens 2012 / Davidson Fellow Honorable Mention 2013
Mentor: Dmitry Vaintrob
Charles Pasternak - Semifinalist Siemens 2012
Mentor: Matt Coudron
Lilly Shen - Semifinalist Siemens 2012 / Semifinalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Jesse Geneson
Kathleen Zhou - Semifinalist Intel STS 2013
Mentor: Teng Fei
Rebecca Chen - Semifinalist Intel STS 2012
Regional Semifinalist Siemens Competition 2011
Mentor: Wenzhe Wei
Sitan Chen - 3rd Prize ($40K) Siemens Competition 2011
2012 Davidson Fellow Laureate ($10K)
Finalist Intel STS 2012
Mentor: Jesse Geneson
Sidharth Dhawan - Semifinalist Intel STS 2012
Mentor: Zachary Abel
Eric Mannes - Semifinalist Intel STS 2012
Mentor: Aaron Potechin
Matthew Rauen - Semifinalist Intel STS 2012
Mentor: Jesse Geneson
Adam H. Su - Semifinalist Intel STS 2012
Regional Semifinalist Siemens Competition 2011
Mentor: Benjamin Iriarte
Wenyu Cao - Finalist Intel STS 2011
Mentor: Rosalie Beranger-Rioux
Randy Jia - Finalist Siemens Competition 2010
Mentor: John Lesieutre
Tian-yi (Damien) Jiang - Regional Finalist Siemens Competition 2009
Mentor: Yan Zhang
Akhil Mathew - 3rd Prize ($50K) Intel STS 2010
Project suggested by Pavel Etingof
Arjun Puranik - Regional Finalist Siemens Competition 2009
Mentor: Martina Balagovic; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof
Dennis Tseng - Regional Finalist Siemens Competition 2009
Mentor: Nan Li
Lynnelle Ye - 2nd Prize ($50K) Siemens Competition 2009 and 4th Prize ($40K) Intel STS 2010
Mentor: Tirasan Khandhawit; Supervisor Tanya Khovanova
Noah Arbesfeld - 6th Place ($25K) Intel STS 2009
Mentor: David Jordan; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof
Eric Larson - 1st Place ($100K) Intel STS 2009 and 2nd Place ($50K) Siemens Competition 2008
Mentor: David Jordan; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof
Max Rabinovich - Finalist Intel STS 2009
Mentor: Emmanuel Stoica; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof and supervised by David Jerison
Adam Sealfron - Finalist Intel STS 2009
Mentor: Victor Chen
Benjamin Dozier - Finalist Intel STS 2008
Mentor: Cameron Freer
Qiaochu Yuan - Finalist Intel STS 2008
Mentor: Ryan Reich
Harrison Chen - Regional Finalist Siemens Competition 2006
Mentor: Zuoqin Wang
Sana Raoof - 1st Place (three-way tie; 1/3 of $175K) Intel ISEF 2008
Mentor: David Jordan
Dmitry Vaintrob - 1st Place ($100K) Siemens Competition 2006 and 3rd Place ($50K) Intel STS 2007
Mentor: Aaron Tievsky; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof
Kimberly Scott - 10th Place ($20K) Intel STS 2006
Yi Sun - 2nd Place ($75K) Intel STS 2006
Steven Byrnes - 1st Prize ($100K) Siemens Westinghouse 2002-2003
Mentor: Edward Early
Christopher Mihelich - 1st Prize ($40K) Westinghouse STS 1998
Mentor: Alexander Soloviev; Project suggested by Sergey Fomin
Travis Schedler - 5th Prize ($15K) Westinghouse STS 1998
Mentor: Alexander Soloviev; Project suggested by Pavel Etingof