Discrete Mathematics with Applications

Susanna Epp's DISCRETE MATHEMATICS WITH APPLICATIONS, FOURTH EDITION provides a clear introduction to discrete mathematics. Renowned for her lucid, accessible prose, Epp explains complex, abstract concepts with clarity and precision. This book presents not only the major themes of discrete mathematics, but also the reasoning that underlies mathematical thought. Students develop the ability to think abstractly as they study the ideas of logic and proof. While learning about such concepts as logic circuits and computer addition, algorithm analysis, recursive thinking, computability, automata, cryptography, and combinatorics, students discover that the ideas of discrete mathematics underlie and are essential to the science and technology of the computer age. Overall, Epp's emphasis on reasoning provides students with a strong foundation for computer science and upper-level mathematics courses.

Susanna S. Epp received her Ph.D. in 1968 from the University of Chicago, taught briefly at Boston University and the University of Illinois at Chicago, and is currently Vincent DePaul Professor of Mathematical Sciences at DePaul University. After initial research in commutative algebra, she became interested in cognitive issues associated with teaching analytical thinking and proof and has published a number of articles and given many talks related to this topic. She has also spoken widely on discrete mathematics and has organized sessions at national meetings on discrete mathematics instruction. In addition to Discrete Mathematics with Applications and Discrete Mathematics: An Introduction to Mathematical Reasoning, she is co-author of Precalculus and Discrete Mathematics, which was developed as part of the University of Chicago School Mathematics Project. Epp co-organized an international symposium on teaching logical reasoning, sponsored by the Institute for Discrete Mathematics and Theoretical Computer Science (DIMACS), and she was an associate editor of Mathematics Magazine from 1991 to 2001. Long active in the Mathematical Association of America (MAA), she is a co-author of the curricular guidelines for undergraduate mathematics programs: CUPM Curriculum Guide 2004.