The Old Mutual Secondary School Mathematics Olympiad

Since 2015, the department has run the Old Mutual Mathematics Olympiad in partnership with Old Mutual Malawi. This follows the signing of a MoU between Mzuni and Old Mutual Malawi in 2014. The Olympiads have grown into a significant community outreach programme for both Old Mutual Malawi and the Department of Mathematics and Statistics.

The Olympiads are mathematics competitions targeting Form Four students. The competitions aim at:

• Discovering, encouraging and challenging mathematically gifted young people in Malawi;
• Encouraging friendly relationships among mathematics teachers in secondary schools;
• Promoting mathematics as a science and technology catalyst.  

The competitions are held over a period of one week in Mzuzu. Participation is by expression of interest. Each interested school nominates up to three students. Schools are allowed to send a teacher to accompany students to the competition. Competitors take a series of three examinations at preliminary, semi-final and final stages. The best students at each stage qualify for the next stage. The best students are identified and awarded prizes at a closing ceremony. Prizes include glittering trophies, tuition fees and mathematics textbooks.

CIMPA School

The Department hosted CIMPA School in 2023. The school, “Coding Theory and its Applications”, was held with support from the International Centre of Pure and Applied Mathematics (CIMPA) and the International Mathematics Union (IMU). CIMPA schools are international schools aimed at involving students and research teaching staff from developing countries. They are held in places where there is real enthusiasm and scope for research project. Mzuzu University’s well-known activities in the coding and cryptography were the inspiration behind the 2023 school, the first CIMPA School in Malawi. The Department, through Dr. Khumbo Kumwenda, partnered with Dr. Elisa Gorla of the University of Neuchatel (Switzerland) hosted the school. It attracted participation of mathematicians from Angola, Benin, Cameroon, Italy, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, South Africa, Spain and Zambia.

Nephtale B. Mumba and Washiela Fish, Binary codes from graphs related to the Johnson graph (n, k, k-1). Discrete Math. Sci. Cryptogr., (2022).

Nephtale B. Mumba, Washiela Fish and Eric Mwambene and B. G. Rodrigues, Binary codes and partial permutation decoding sets from biadjacency matrices of bipartite graphs (2k, k,k+1,1); Quest. Math., 43(4), (2020), 523-538.

Khumbo Kumwenda and Caleb Namondwe, The weight distribution of hulls of binary codes from incidence matrices of complete graphs, Quaestiones Mathematicae, 46(5), (2022) http://dx.doi.org/10.2989/16073606.2022.2050434

Khumbo Kumwenda and Atipatsa Kaminga, Content Areas and Performance of Students in the Old Mutual Mathematics Olympiad in Malawi, African Journal of Research in Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 26(1), (2022) 24-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/18117295.2022.2059235

Augustine Musukwa, Massimiliano Sala, et. al., On Second-Order Derivatives of Boolean Functions and Cubic APN Permutations in Even Dimension, Mediterranean Journal of Mathematics, 21 (116), 2024, 1-24.

Augustine Musukwa, Massimiliano Sala, et. al., On cryptographic properties of cubic and splitting Boolean functions, Applicable Algebra in Engineering, Communication and Computing, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00200-022-00575-2

Jiayou Luo, Miyang Luo, Atipatsa C Kaminga, et. Al., Integrative metabolomics highlights gut microbiota metabolite as novel NAFLD-related candidate biomarkers in Children, Microbiology Spectrum, 12(4), 2024, 1-21.

Zhao Hu, Feixiang Zhou, Atipatsa C Kaminga et. Al., Type 2 Diabetes, Fasting Glucose, Hemoglobin A1c Levels and Risk of Primary Open-Angle Glaucoma: A Mendelian Randomization Study, Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science, 63 (5), 2022, 1-7

Edna Chilenje Manda and Faraimunashe Chirove, A theoretical model of chronic hepatitis B virus with suboptimal adherence and drug resistance, Mathematical Methods in the Applied Sciences, 44(5), 2020, 1298-1325

Edna Chilenje Manda and Faraimunashe Chirove, Acute hepatitis virus infection model within the host incorporating immune cells and cytokine responses, Theory in Biosciences, 139 (5258), (2020) 1-17