Melkamu Zeleke Professor • Department of Mathematical Sciences View CV I joined William Paterson University in 1998 after earning my PhD in Mathematics from Temple University, where I worked under the mentorship of Doron Zeilberger, a distinguished Experimental Mathematician and passionate advocate for rethinking how we teach and engage with mathematics. Teaching mathematics with enthusiasm brings me immense joy, and the success of my students is my constant source of motivation. I am deeply committed to the belief that every individual has the innate ability to learn, including mathematics, and I work diligently to ensure my students grasp the concepts I present in class.My primary research interest lies in Combinatorics, a field of modern mathematics with significant applications in computer science, probability theory, data analysis, and algorithms. I have published peer-reviewed research in respected mathematics journals, such as the Annals of Combinatorics and Advances in Applied Mathematics. Currently, my work focuses on Riordan arrays and their applications in Combinatorics. Riordan arrays, when combined with Shapiro’s multiplication rule, form a group that offers a unique framework for solving combinatorial problems. I am a Fellow of the Institute of Combinatorics & its Applications and serve as a referee for several prominent mathematics journals.From July 2004 to June 2010, I had the privilege of serving as the Chair of the Mathematics Department. Currently, I am the Associate Dean of the College of Science and Health. Additionally, I am honored to have received the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board award and served as a US Fulbright Scholar at Addis Ababa University in Ethiopia from August 2010 to June 2011. Professional Interests Conducting research in enumerative combinatorics and mentoring students. Other Interests Sports: Tennis, Basketball, and Soccer; World History; Classic Movies. Degrees PhD Mathematics, Temple University Philadelphia, PA MS Mathematics, Addis Ababa University Addis Ababa, Ethiopia BS Mathematics, Addis Ababa University Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Specialization Combinatorics and Number Theory Representative Publications Central Trinomial Numbers, Motzkin Trees, and the Riordan Group; On Combinatorial Interpretations of Some Elements of the Riordan Group; Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing; Springer Proceedings in Mathematics & Statistics; 2024 On the Mobius Function of a Pointed Graded Lattice; , Indian Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics; Volume 49, 2018 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13226-018-0255-x On Subsets of Ordered Trees Enumerated by a Subsequence of Fibonacci Numbers ; , Proceedings of INTEGERS 2013 conference: The Erdos Centennial; Volume 15A, 2015 http://math.colgate.edu/~integers/vol15a.html Representative Presentations Central Trinomial Numbers, Motzkin Trees, and the Riordan Group 9th International Conference on Riordan Arrays and Related Topics (9 RART) National Science Foundation Washington, DC 2024 On Combinatorial Interpretations of Shapiro’s Identities Involving some Elements of the Bell Subgroup. Joint Mathematics Meetings AMS Special Session American Mathematical Society Baltimore, MD 2019 Riordan Arrays and their Applications in Combinatorics International Science Symposium Adama Science and Technology University Adama, 2016 On Subsets of Ordered Trees Enumerated by a Subsequence of Fibonacci Numbers Algorithmic and Enumerative Combinatorics Summer School Research Institute for Symbolic Computation (RISC) Hagenberg, 2014 Awards and Honors Fulbright J. William Fulbright Scholarship Board 01/01/2010 Distinguished Teaching Award Temple University 05/01/1997 Gold Medal for Outstanding Student of the Year Addis Ababa University 07/01/1989 Notable Courses Taught Riordan Arrays and their Applications in Combinatorics, Selected Topics in Algebraic & Enumerative Combinatorics, Advanced Discrete Mathematics, Ordinary Differential Equations, and Logic & Methods of Higher Mathematics. Email 973 720 2574 3050 Hennings Science East By appointment