12 stories you might have missed from 2025

Monday, December 22, 2025

As we enter the holiday season, it’s hard to believe that another year is drawing to a close. A lot has happened this year in the Faculty of Mathematics! Here are twelve stories from 2025 that you might have missed the first time around:

  1.  Coding for a greener internet (January 20): Waterloo researchers find a way to reduce data centre energy use by up to 30 percent
  2.  Will paper cups help you ‘Roll Up to Win’? (February 21) Biostatistics professor Dr. Michael Wallace is back for another year of cracking open the iconic Tim Hortons contest
  3.  Remembering Siv Sivaloganathan (March 7) – The Faculty of Math bids farewell to a beloved colleague
  4.  High blood pressure? Eat more bananas (April 14) – Researchers discover an unusual impact of potassium intake on the body
  5.  Making virtual reality more accessible (May 5) – Working with users with disabilities to make video game movements customizable to user needs
  6.  WWII codebreaker and mathematician Tutte honoured with stamp (May 8) – C&O founder finally recognized for his top-secret war work
  7.  From biostatistics to transforming community health (July 4) – Waterloo alum Dr. Zainab Abdurrahman (MMath '03) becomes first Black female president of Ontario Medical Association
  8.  Watermarks offer no defense against deepfakes (July 23) – Waterloo researchers discover how to remove much-touted AI security feature
  9.  Optimizing M4 (September 8) – C&O profs on the unique optimization problems that come with a new building
  10.  Google partners with University of Waterloo to shape the future of work and learning (October 1) – Dr. Edith Law named Google Chair in the Future of Work and Learning
  11.  Carrying the “math bundle” (October 29) – Hagey Lecturer Dr. Edward Doolittle on Indigenizing mathematics
  12.  Predicting disease outbreaks using social media (November 18) – Chris Bauch applies the theory of “tipping points” to vaccine skepticism on social media