CCS110   Introduction

Computational Science is the study of problem solving techniques and principles via numerical methods using computer systems.  This introductory course will cover computer based methods to analyze problems, handle and manipulate data, formulate solutions, and implement algorithms using high level languages and tools.

General Information

Welcome to CCS 110, An Introduction to Computational Science.  This course teaches basic problem solving techniques using Unix computers and the Mathematica system.  Topics include


• General principles of problem solving via computational methods;
• Mathematica: a flexible and powerful computational software package for numeric and symbolic computations;
• Case studies in computational problem solving from the physical sciences, biological sciences, and economics and statistics.

There is essentially no prerequisite for this course; just be prepared for hard work.  Although this is listed as a CS course, it is intended for all science majors, as well as for students in disciplines such as economics, political science, psychology, and other subjects where quantitative problem solving techniques might be useful.

This Offering

This Web page was developed as part of an undergraduate curricular initiative in Computational Science, and was sponsored by the Mathematical, Information, and Computational Sciences (MICS) Division of the U.S. Department of Energy, under grant # DE-FG02-96ER25303.  Other courses developed within this initiative may be found here.  The course materials within this site are intended to be complete and self-contained; they comprise a set of offerings for an undergraduate minor or concentration in Computational Science and may be adopted in whole or in part by any educational institution.

Information specific to the current offering of CCS110, such as meeting days and times, instructor, assessment and evaluation scheme, test dates, etc., may be found here.

Online Resources

A complete set of course materials, as well as links to external resources are accessible, starting at this page.  These include:


• lecture notes and reading materials
• homework and practice exercises
• links to related courses

Request for Feedback



Instructors and institutions accessing or using these materials are requested to provide feedback as well as contributions to extend and enhance the materials; please send email to Dr. Vaidy Sunderam at vss@mathcs.emory.edu