English

This course provides an introduction to classical mechanics covering vectors, applications of Newton’s laws, conservation laws and forces, motion in a plane, circular motion, equilibrium and elasticity, rotational motion, simple harmonic motion, energy and power; mechanical and sound waves, temperature, heat and the first law of thermodynamics. Prerequisite: first semester of differential calculus.

This course examines mathematical concepts for stochastic calculus. The topics include: introduction to continuous time stochastic processes; definition and properties of Brownian motion; semimartingales; Stochastic integration; Itô (change of variable) formula; theorems for applications (e.g., Girsanov’s theorem).

This course develops presentation skills for speaking before academic audiences. Students practice writing to think through research and communicate thoughts by means of informative and appealing texts. This intensive course, designed as a series of interactive workshops, offers an opportunity to present and write in English within the student's own discipline and reflect on use of academic sources, AI literacy, presentation skills, writing habits, and writer identity. Students choose a research problem to investigate and follow the stages of researching and writing as two interlinked processes: focus the research question, conduct the literature review, collect the best evidence to argue for the importance of the research project. The course also provides an opportunity to read like a writer by analyzing model texts and sample texts written by peers to better understand rhetorical strategies and stylistic conventions of selected academic text types. Students practice presenting by preparing three 3-minute presentations based on secondary sources about the research question, delivered for a small group of peers. They also present for 7 minutes in front of the whole class to share their views, engage in a question-and-answer session, and hear feedback on their performance. Students also practice writing and giving feedback through drafting three sections of the research paper (extended definition of a key concept, literature review, introduction or discussion/conclusion), cite primary as well as secondary sources, and acknowledge collaboration with AI. Students exchange feedback on drafts with peers and receive comments from tutors in order to rewrite their texts for greater persuasiveness and clarity. The semester of reading, writing, presenting, and exchanging ideas with international peers from various disciplines allow students to become better academic communicators.

This course addresses concepts related to happiness as a purpose of life; sense of community, and human flourishing, covering topics such as the biopsychosocial self; mentral restructuring; virtue ethics; hedonist ethics; senstiviity; neuroscience and plasticity of the mind; empathy, sense of community; love and attachments, and spirituality. The course focuses on the transformation of the person and the person in society through exercises aligned to academic and scientific concepts. 

This course offers an in-depth analysis of the nature and dynamics of modern Egyptian politics. In order to familiarize students with post-1952 Egypt, assessments of the Nasser, Sadat and Mubarak presidencies constitute the introductory theme of this course. Once the trends and general imprints of each Presidency are established, this course then focuses on the major issues and themes confronting and shaping Egypt's post 2011 political arena. Such themes include but are not limited to the following: The fall of Mubarak regime, the rise of the Second Republic and the subsequent parliamentary and presidential elections. The second part of the course also analyzes patterns of civil participation, the role of the military, as well as the role of the Muslim Brotherhood and their fall from power after the June 2013 Uprising.

The Zionist ideology and movement in its own terms, and in the context of modern Judaism. The course places Zionism in its historical and religious contexts, and examines its varieties. The Zionist movement is followed from its origins to the establishment of Israel. Related aspects of Israeli politics are then examined, with special reference to ideological and religious debates.

This course covers the following topics: graph algorithms such as max flow; data structures such as van Emde Boas Trees; NP-completeness; exponential and parameterized algorithms for NP-hard problems; approximation algorithms; randomized algorithms; computational geometry; linear programming and optimization.

This course explores the broad, societal implications of capitalism. It explores three main topics—colonialism, gender, and ecology—to investigate how we can view capitalism as extending beyond the market economy, mode of production, and class relations. Furthermore, these three topics allow us to connect critiques of capitalism to major societal issues and core themes in contemporary economics, namely inequality and ecological crises and policies. The course critically examines both the foundations of capitalism theories and key critiques, encouraging students to assess the relevance of these perspectives in understanding contemporary economic challenges. The course specifically deals with economics but takes an interdisciplinary approach. Large parts of the curriculum come from other disciplines, mainly sociology, political theory, human geography, and philosophy. At its core, the course equips students with the tools to critically engage with these critiques, examine their strengths and limitations, and relate them to mainstream economic theory and research.

This course introduces students to fundamental techniques for mobile autonomous robotics. In this course, a robot is a computer mounted on a chassis with controllable wheels. To allow the robot to perceive its surroundings, a camera and several distance sensors are attached to the computer. This course is oriented towards the practical aspects of mobile robotics and students in groups solve a set of assignments on the robots. Furthermore, the course introduces relevant robotics theory and methods including control, navigation, and localization of the robot as well as problem solving with robots including hardware/software trouble shooting. Some methods for analyzing sensor data are also covered. The course finishes with a larger assignment.

This course introduces students to the study of Comparative Literature through 19th-century novels from France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Spain, and the UK. All texts are read in English translation. Students are introduced to a representative and canonical range of fictional works, with focus on one literary genre - the novel - and one over-arching theme. Lecturers, seminar leaders, and secondary criticism all model a variety of comparative approaches for students and promote discussion of the discipline.