Chris Spicer, associate professor of mathematics, and two students recently had an article published that evaluated a claim made by Sheldon Cooper on the CBS sitcom “The Big Bang Theory.”

Chris Spicer	Jessie Byrnes	Alyssa Turnquist

Chris Spicer, associate professor of mathematics at Morningside College, and two students recently had an article published that evaluated a claim made by Sheldon Cooper on the CBS sitcom “The Big Bang Theory.”

Their article, “The Sheldon Conjecture,” was published in the Mathematical Association of America’s Math Horizons. It evaluated a mathematical claim Sheldon Cooper made regarding the number 73.

Spicer wrote the article with Jessie Byrnes of Harlan, Iowa, who graduated from Morningside in May, and Alyssa Turnquist of Alta, Iowa, who is a senior at Morningside.

“We thought it would be a fun problem to work on and have the students learn some number theory along the way,” Spicer said. “The students now have a peer-reviewed publication that they can put on their resumes.”

Spicer came to Morningside in fall of 2009. He won a Walker Faculty Excellence Award from Morningside College in 2011 and 2014. He received his doctorate from North Dakota State University.