Robin Belton, Assistant Professor of Mathematics and Statistics, received support from the Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute’s Promoting Research Opportunities and Open Forums (PROOF) program.

PROOF summer awards provide opportunities for collaborating mathematicians and statisticians to come together in person for two weeks at UC Berkeley’s Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute (SLMath).

Robin’s research focuses on Topological Data Analysis (TDA), which studies the “shape” of data and has numerous applications, ranging from detecting the severity of cancer to differentiating similar audio signals. A fundamental tool in TDA is (single-parameter) persistent homology. Robin’s group studies the more complicated setting of multi-parameter persistent homology, with the goal of understanding it better so that it can one day provide a more viable data analysis technique.

She worked on this project at SLMath with Dr. Robyn Brooks (University of Utah) and Dr. Elizabeth Vidaurre (Molloy University). They originally met at a “Women in Topology” workshop at SLMath in 2017, so it felt to Robin like a full-circle moment to return.

PROOF 2026 was supported by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) and the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF).