Michael Laufer is a fifth year student in the Mathematics PhD program CUNY Graduate Center. After graduating with a dual B.A. in math and physics from Sonoma State University, specializing in theoretical physics and mure mathematics, he came to New York to study mathematical models of the standard model of particle physics.
Michael is currenltly working on lattice versions of the Yang-Mills mass-gap problem (see http://www.claymath.org/millennium/Yang-Mills_Theory/) for his PhD dissertation. As a GK-12 Fellow, Laufer is developing a course, What is the Shape of the Universe, which introduces students to mathematical thinking and research. Michael is currently hosted at Queens Science High School where he works with 9th and 10th grade mathematics classes, and test-pilots units from the course.