| Title | : | Introduction to Combinatorial Game Theory and the Game of Nim |
| Speaker | : | Saraswati Nanoti (IITGN) |
| Details | : | Fri, 21 Feb, 2025 3:00 PM @ CS 36 (CSB) |
| Abstract: | : | In this talk, we will begin by playing a simple two player game called Reach 100. In this game, there is a counter which is initially set to 0. In each move, a player is allowed to increment the counter by any positive integer between 1 and 10 (both included). The player who makes the counter reach 100 wins. We will try to figure out whether it is possible for one of the players to force a win in this game. After this, we will define the game of Nim and try to figure out which player can force a win in various situations.
We will discuss which positions are favourable for each of the players and we will then formally define what is a combinatorial game, a game tree and a winning strategy. We will then discuss how to combine various games of Nim and how various games of Nim form a group structure. If time permits, we will discuss a winning strategy which works for all the games of Nim and another game called Wythoff Nim. This talk will be an interactive session where the audience will play games with each other in order to figure out the formal definitions and proofs.
Brief Bio: Saraswati Girish Nanoti is a PhD student at IIT Gandhinagar working under the supervision of Prof Neeldhara Misra. She has just submitted her thesis titled: Games on Graphs and Graphs from Games. Her main research interests are games on graphs, graph algorithms and parameterized complexity. In addition to that she has started exploring the field of combinatorial game theory and also plans to work in the field of CS/Math Education at the Centre for Creative Learning, IIT Gandhinagar. |
