Doctoral students work closely with USM faculty on research projects. Before, if I had a complex problem, I would try to make approximations and solve it with mathematical techniques. Or, I would go into the laboratory and see if I could measure whatever it was. Now, we're able to develop computer models and simulate them. He collaborated with reseachers in the U.S. and abroad on designing random number generators for parallel computers.
Parallel computers are computers that use more than one processor to solve the same problem.
He also worked on problems related to national security. Specifically, he focused on ways to use new computers to model the nervous system. Mascagni earned a bachelor's in biomedical engineering from the University of Iowa in 1981. While working as a graduate fellow in theoretical neurobiology at The Rockefeller University in Manhattan, he completed work on a bachelor's in mathematics, also from Iowa. While in New York City, he also took courses at Columbia University and the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University.