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ERIK DEMAINE: Hi,
I'm Erik Demaine,

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and I'm a professor of
computer science here at MIT.

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And I'm one of three professors
in charge of this class

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this semester-- 6.046
So I taught about half

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of the lectures in the class.

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Srini taught the other half.

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And Nancy prepared
new problem sets.

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And we all worked
together on everything

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in the class pretty much.

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We had, I think, 10 TAs
and then another 5 graders.

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So it's a big teaching
infrastructure

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to deliver algorithms
to 300 students.

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My entire career at
MIT, all I have done

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is taught different
forms of algorithms.

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So 6.046 holds a place
particularly dear to my heart.

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It's a class that's
evolved over time,

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so there's an older
version of 6.046 on OCW

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when algorithms in the
undergraduate level

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was all taught in one semester,
which was exciting, but also

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pretty intense and didn't
really go into a lot of depth.

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So several years ago,
we split that class

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into two-- 6.006, which is
introductory algorithms.

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And the new 6.046, which
is this class, which

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is intermediate algorithms
beyond what you could implement

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in an hour-- things that
you have to think more about

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and prove theorems about.

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So 6.046 is sort of the
more theoretical counterpart

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and gets into much more deeper
algorithms, and it's exciting.

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And all of my research is
also around algorithms.

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So this is me living the dream,
teaching the topic that I love.

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And it's an exciting class.

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This as an undergraduate
class, so the material

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is stuff that I should
know really well.

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But every time I
teach it, I find

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that I learn it at
an even deeper level

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and understand it better.

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Also, because I try
to add in new topics

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that I don't know so well,
so I learn them even better.

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And that, in turn,
influences my research.

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So once I understand
the basics really well,

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I can apply them in new
and interesting ways

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to solve problems I didn't
know how to solve before.

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Algorithms are just so much fun.

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Sometimes I start the class
with I'm Erik Demaine,

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and I love the algorithms!

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It's just such a-- it's
really fun material.

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It's very creative.

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It's almost like an
art form to come up

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with a beautiful algorithm.

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And this class teaches so
many different algorithms

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that others have developed.

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It's kind of like the
cream of the crop.

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There's zillions out there,
so we can't cover all of them.

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So we take out
representative examples

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and find really cool,
really interesting,

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or really beautiful algorithms.

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And it's really fun
to cover them all

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and to share that beauty
with the students.

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I think I've taught this class
10 times in some version.

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So it's been an adventure.

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Every time is different.

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And, of course, the last
time is always the best.

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Next time will be even
better, hopefully.