Zachary Porat
About Papers Talks Teaching Service Notes Misc. Blog
About Me
My name is Zachary (Zack) Porat. I am currently a PhD candidate in mathematics at Wesleyan University. My advisor is David Pollack.
My research interests lie in number theory and arithmetic geometry. I particularly enjoy the computational aspects of these subjects. Currently, I am studying automorphic forms for congruence subgroups of SL(3, Z).
Before Wesleyan, I obtained my B.S. in Mathematics from Union College. Outside of math, I enjoy bouldering and playing trumpet. I also occasionally blog about my travels as a grad student.
Here is a copy of my CV, last updated in June 2025: PDF
Papers
(Note that preprints may differ from the final published version.)
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Family Sizes for Complete Multipartite Graphs (with Danielle Gregg, Thomas Mattman, and George Todd), Involve, a Journal of Mathematics 15:4 (2022), 669-686.
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PIXE Analysis of Synthetic Turf (with Sajju Chalise, Morgan Clark, Skye Conlan, Scott LaBrake, and Michael Vineyard), Environment and Ecology Research 6:1 (2018), 60-65.
Recent and Upcoming Talks
I will be attending LuCaNT 2025 at ICERM from July 7-11.
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Talk Title TBD - Upcoming (October 25-26, 2025)
- AMS Fall Eastern Sectional Meeting (Virtual)
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Talk Title TBD - Upcoming (October 3-5, 2025)
- AMS Fall Southeastern Sectional Meeting (Tulane University)
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Computing the Hecke Action Directly on the Cuspidal Cohomology of Congruence Subgroups of SL(3, Z) - July 4, 2025
- 33èmes Journées Arithmétiques (University of Luxembourg)
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Heuristics for (Ir)reducibility of Strata of the Moduli Space of Hyperelliptic Curves - May 16, 2025
- AWM Research Symposium: Special Session on Curves and Abelian Varieties in Characteristic p (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
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Advances in Computations on the Cohomology of Congruence Subgroups of SL(3, Z) - May 4, 2025
- 37th Automorphic Forms Workshop (University of North Texas)
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The Evolving Role of Computers in Mathematics - April 19, 2025
- AMS New England Graduate Student Conference (Brown University)
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Computations Directly on the Cuspidal Cohomology of Congruence Subgroups of SL(3, Z) - October 6, 2024
- Conférence de Théorie des Nombres Québec-Maine (Université Laval)
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Additional Computations of the Hecke Action on the Cuspidal Cohomology of Congruence Subgroups of SL(3, Z) - May 24, 2024
- 36th Automorphic Forms Workshop (Oklahoma State University)
Teaching
I am not teaching in Spring 2025.
While at Wesleyan, I have taught Calculus I and Elementary Statistics. I have also been a Teaching Assistant for several courses and worked in the Math Workshop.
Additionally, I have run several mentorship projects as part of Wesleyan’s Directed Reading Program. In Spring 2025, I presented a mini-course on mathematical cryptology at SWiM@Wes 2025 and served as a project assistant at Arithmetic Geometry at UNT.
Service
I am currently one of the organizers of our Directed Reading Program.
I previously served as President (Fall 2023–Spring 2025) and Vice President (Fall 2021–Spring 2023) of Wesleyan’s AMS Graduate Student Chapter. Additionally, from Spring 2022 through Fall 2023, I was a co-organizer of the departmental Graduate Student Seminar.
Expository Notes and More
Here are some notes and code that I have put together for one reason or another. Please let me know if you find any errors.
Miscellaneous
On My Bookshelf
- A First Course in Modular Forms (Fred Diamond and Jerry Shurman)
- Linear Algebraic Groups (T.A. Springer)
- Number Fields (Daniel A. Marcus)
Helpful Resources
- J.S. Milne’s Course Notes
- Keith Conrad’s Expository Papers
- The L-functions and Modular Forms Database (LMFDB)
Useful LaTeX Links
- Tool for figuring out LaTeX code for math symbols
- Tool for creating tables in LaTeX
- Tool for creating commutative diagrams in LaTeX (TikzCD)
- (Bonus: Fun LaTeX Typesetting game)
Some (Mathematical) Friends
- Lydia Ahlstrom
- Thomas Bouchet
- Erik Davis
- Steven Groen
- Asimina Hamakiotes
- Jeffrey Hatley
- Zonia Menendez-Deaton
- Freddy Saia
- Jacob Tolman
- Benjamin York
- Arianna Zikos