Boğaziçi University,

Department of Mathematics
Bebek, Istanbul,
Turkey
T 0551 5994117

Ümit Işlak Í
B [email protected]
https://sites.google.com/site/umitislak/home

Appointments
Current Associate Professor, Boğaziçi University, Dept. of Mathematics, Istanbul, Turkey.
Current Adjunct Faculty, Boğaziçi University, Dept. of Computational Sciences and Engi-
neering, Istanbul, Turkey.
2015-2016 Jack Hale Postdoctoral Fellow, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA.
2014-2015 Dunham Jackson Assistant Professor, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis,
MN.
2014 Research Associate, Paris VI, Laboratoire de Probabilités et Modeles Aleatoires,
Paris.
2010-2014 Teaching and Research Assistant, University of Southern California, Los Angeles,
CA.
2007-2010 Teaching Assistant, Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Education
2014 Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics, University of Southern California, Los Angeles,
CA, USA.
2013 M.Sc. in Statistics, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
2010 M.Sc. in Mathematics, Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey.
2007 B.Sc. in Mathematics, Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Research Interests
Probability theory and related fields. More particularly, Stein’s method, subsequence
problems, random permutation/word statistics, random graphs/trees, Markov chains,
statistical learning theory, time series analysis (theory and applications)

Publications
(with Yunus E. Demirci and Alperen Y. Ozdemir), Mixing time bounds for edge flip-
ping on regular graphs, to appear in Journal of Applied Probability, arXiv:2201.03315,
17 pages, 2023.
(with Christian Houdré) A central limit theorem for the length of the longest com-
mon subsequence in random words, Electronic Journal of Probability, 1-24, 2023.
(with Yunus E. Demirci and Mehmet A. Yıldız) On a cover time problem on a
dynamic graph with steps at random times, Statistics and Probability Letters, 2023.
(with Ella Hiesmayr) Asymptotic results on Hoppe trees and their variations. Journal
of Applied Probability 57.2: 441-457, 2020.
(with Alperen Yaşar Özdemir) On an alternative sequence comparison statistic of
Steele. Discrete Mathematics & Theoretical Computer Science 22, 2020.
(with Jay Bartroff and Larry Goldstein) Bounded size biased couplings for log
concave distributions and concentration of measure for occupancy models, Bernoulli,
24(4B), 3283-3317, 2018.
(with Ïlker Arslan and Cihan Pehlivan) On unfair permutations, Statistics and
Probability Letters, 2018.
(with Alperen Yaşar Özdemir), Asymptotic results on weakly increasing subse-
quences in random words. Discrete Applied Mathematics 251,171-189, 2018.
Descent-Inversion statistics in riffle shuffles, Turkish Journal of Mathematics 42.2:
502-514, 2018.
Asymptotic results for random sums of dependent random variables, Statistics and
Probability Letters, 2017.
(with Serdar Altok) On leaf related statistics in recursive tree models, Statistics &
Probability Letters 121, 61-69, 2016.
Concentration inequalities with bounded couplings, PhD Dissertation, 125 pages,
2014.
(with Larry Goldstein) Concentration inequalities via zero-biased couplings, Statistics
and Probability Letters, vol 86, pp. 17-23, http://arxiv.org/abs/1304.5001, 2014.
Propp-Wilson algorithm and beyond, Master’s thesis, Boğaziçi University, 2010

Preprints
(with İlker Arslan) On local convexity and convex subsequences in random discrete
sequences, 7 pages, 2023.
(with Altar Çiçeksiz and Yunus E. Demirci) The Variance and the Asymptotic
Distribution of the Length of Longest k-alternating Subsequences. arXiv:2107.12459,
13 pages, 2021.
(with Oğuz Gürerk and Mehmet A. Yıldız) A study on random permutation graphs,
preprint, arXiv:1901.06678, 21 pages, 2021.
(with Ella Hiesmayr) Some remarks on biased recursive trees, preprint,
arXiv:1801.04617, 27 pages, 2018.
(with Ruoting Gong, and Christian Houdré) A central limit theorem for the optimal
alignments score in multiple random words. arXiv:1512.05699, 30 pages, 2016.
(with Subhankar Ghosh) Multivariate concentration inequalities with size biased
couplings, 11 pages, http://arxiv.org/abs/1310.5448, 2013 (not considered for
publication anymore since the main result was proven independently by Arratia and
Baxendale in arXiv:1306.0157 in the same year).
 Projects
(TÜBİTAK 1001. Researcher) Title: Özel Çizgelerin Rastgele Üretilmesi, Principal
investigator: Tınaz Ekim, 2022-.
(BAP 16483. Principal investigator) Title: Outliers, order statistics, and concentra-
tion inequalities, 2020-.
(BIDEB 2232. Principal investigator) Title: Stein’s method and subsequence prob-
lems, 2017-2019.

Books
2022 Ayrık Matematikte Seçme Konular I, 328 pages, Nesin Yayınevi, 2022.
2022 Temel Olasılık Teorisi ve Matematiksel İstatistik I, 384 pages, Nesin Yayınevi, 2022.
2021 (with Arda Akdemir) Markov Zincirlerine Kısa Bir Giriş, 120 pages, will not be
published, available through Researchgate.

Translation
2023 Lockhart, P., Aritmetik, to appear by TÜBİTAK Yayınları, in preparation. (Original
book: Lockhart, Paul. Arithmetic. Harvard University Press, 2019.)
2021 (with Fatih Demirkale and Oktay Ölmez) Robin J. Wilson, Introduction to Graph
Theory, English to Turkish, completed, Palme Yayınevi.

Teaching Experience
Boğaziçi University, Instructor, Mathematics Department
Math 234 - Advanced Calculus II
Math 231 - Advanced Calculus I
Math 532 - Real Analysis II
Math 531 - Real Analysis I
Math 544 - Stochastic processes and martingales
Math 541 - Probability Theory
Math 585 - Sel. Top. in Probability and Statistics: Statistical learning theory
Math 345 - Probability
Math 132 - Calculus of a single variable
Math 131 - Calculus of a single variable
Math 162 - Discrete Mathematics
Math 201 - Matrix Algebra
Math 344 - Introduction to Probability and Statistics
Math 361 - Combinatorics
Math 48X - Introduction to probabilistic number theory
Math 101 - Calculus I
Math 102 - Calculus II
Math 331 - Metric spaces
 Georgia Institute of Technology, Instructor, Mathematics Department
Math 1551 - Differential Calculus, Fall 2015, Spring 2016
University of Minnesota, Instructor, Mathematics Department
Math 5651 - Basic Theory of Probability and Statistics, Fall 2014, Spring 2015
University of Southern California, Teaching Assistant, Mathematics De-
partment
Math 445 - Advanced Engineering Mathematics II, Spring 2013
Math 308 - Statistical Inference and Data Analysis II, Fall 2013
Math 218 - Statistics for Business Students, Spring 2012
Math 118 - Calculus for Business Students, Fall 2012

Graduate Students - MS
2022 (joint with Mustafa Baydoğan) Can Hakan Dağıdır, Covariance estimation of spatio-
temporal random variables with Kronecker product based models, BU Math, Mas-
ter’s thesis.
2022 (joint with İlker Arslan) Elif Yılmaz, Short-term forecast methodologies and case
studies in traffic flow, BU CSE, Master’s thesis.
2021 Yunus Emre Demirci, Stationary distributions and convergence rates for the edge
flipping process, BU Math, Master’s Thesis.
2020 Mehmet Akif Yıldız, On online and approximate cover times, BU Math, Master’s
Thesis.
2018 Abdurrahman Demirelli, First moment problem in longest common subsequences,
BU Math, Master’s Thesis.
2018 Ella Hiesmayr,On asymptotics of two non-uniform recursive tree models, BU Math,
Master’s Thesis.
current Barış Yeşiloğlu (Boğaziçi Math), Harun Özkan (Boğaziçi CSE), (joint with Atabey
graduate Kaygun) Hakan Erçe (Boğaziçi CSE), (joint with Atabey Kaygun) Erkin Şimşek
(Boğaziçi CSE), (joint with Atabey Kaygun) Hüseyin Saruhan (İTÜ Math. Eng.),
undergrad I had around 20 students working with me towards their senior thesis project.

Selected Awards/Honors
2023 Matematik Vakfı Hayri Körezlioğlu Research Award
2021 YÖK - Associate Professor.
2017 TUBITAK BIDEB-2232 Fellowship.
2016 Thank a Teacher Award, Georgia Institute of Technology.
2013 Theodore Edward Harris Graduate Research Prize, University of Southern California.
2013 Dissertation Completion Fellowship, University of Southern California.
2010 Merit Fellowship for 2010-2011 and summer 2011, University of Southern California.
2010 Best Graduate Instructor Award, Boğaziçi University.