LMS PRESIDENT-DESIGNATE · 2018-01-16 · hyperbolic geometry and symbolic dynamics. Revealing their deep links, it has had appli-cations to ergodic theory and Diophantine approximation,

NEWSLETTER No. 460 July 2016

SOCIETY MEETINGS AND EVENTS

• 21July:SocietyMeetingatthe7ECM,Berlinpage 21• 15September:MidlandsRegionalMeeting,Birminghampage 14

• 21September:PopularLectures,Birminghampage 15• 11November:GraduateStudentMeeting,London• 11November:AnnualGeneralMeeting,London

• 20December:SW&SouthWalesRegionalMeeting,Bath

• 24February2017:MaryCartwrightLecture,London• 3–7April2017:LMSSocietyMeetingatBMC,Surrey• 30June2017:GraduateStudentMeeting,London• 30June2017:GeneralMeeting,London

NEWSLETTERONLINE:newsletter.lms.ac.uk @LondMathSoc

The London Mathematical Society is pleased to announceProfessor Caroline Series FRS, University ofWarwick, as Presi-

dent-Designate. Professor Series will take over from the currentPresident,ProfessorSimonTavaré,FRS,FMedSci,inNovember2017.Professor Series is known forher leading contributions tohyper-bolicgeometryandsymbolicdynamics,andforthemajorimpactofhernumerous initiatives towards theadvancementofwomeninmathematics.Professor Tavaré commented, "I welcome the opportunity toworkwith Professor Series in her year as President-Designate aswecontinuetheLMS’seffortstosupportmathematicsintheUK".

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LMS PRESIDENT-DESIGNATE

©MichelleTennison

NIGEL HITCHIN AWARDED SHAW PRIZE IN MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES

NigelJ.Hitchin,SavilianProfessorofGeometryattheUniversityofOxfordandPastPresidentof theLMS, is thewinnerof the

2016ShawPrizeinMathematicalSciences.Thisinternationalawardhonours individuals who are currently active in their respectivefieldsandwhohaverecentlyachieveddistinguishedandsignificantadvances, who have made outstanding contributions in academicandscientificresearchorapplications,orwhoinotherdomainshaveachievedexcellence.ProfessorHitchinwasawardedtheprizefor"hisfar-reachingcon-tributionstogeometry,representationtheoryandtheoreticalphysics.Thefundamentalandelegantconceptsandtechniquesthathehasintroducedhavehadwideimpactandareoflastingimportance".

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LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk

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AwardsBirthdayHonours.........................................CollingwoodMemorialPrize......................ExcellenceinMathematicsEducationAward........................................................ShawPrizeinMathematicalSciences.........

Calendar of Events

LMS ItemsCouncilDiary.................................................LMSPrizes.....................................................NewsforUndergraduates,PGs&ECRs......PresidentDesignate.....................................

LMS MeetingsMidlandsRegionalMeeting&Workshop...PopularLectures...........................................SocietyMeetingat7ECMBerlin.................

MeetingsAlgebra,Combinatorics,DynamicsandApplications...............................................British Science Festival................................Dynamic Networks INI Workshop...........Geometric Models of Nuclear Matter......MathematicsEducationfortheNext Decade..............................................NewDevelopmentsinDataPrivacyINIWorkshop.............................................Representations andHomology.................StatisticalModelling INIWorkshop...........

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Stochastic Analysis.......................................TopicsinSDEsandtheirLinkto(S)PDEs.....

NewsAmerican Mathematical Society................BeautyofMathematics...............................DeutscheMathematiker-Vereinigung........EPSRC’sDoctoralTrainingPartnershipsand the Mathematical Sciences..............European News...........................................MathematicsPolicyRound-up....................

ObituariesBarth,Karl.....................................................McCrudden,Michael....................................

ReportsCecilKingTravelScholarship......................DavidCrightonMedal.................................DynamicsofComplexSystems....................NorthBritishFunctionalAnalysisSeminar...Operators,OperatorFamiliesandAsymptotics........................................YoungAppliedAnalystsintheUK.............

ReviewsLivrodeProblemasdeAlmadaNegreiros...MathematicalMindsets...............................QuiteRight...................................................TheG.H.HardyReader................................

VisitsIzzo,Alexander.............................................Lamouki,Reza...............................................

No. 460 July 2016Contents

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Editorial officeLondonMathematicalSociety,DeMorganHouse,57–58RussellSquare,LondonWC1B4HS(t:02076373686;f:02073233655)

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General EditorMrA.J.S.Mann([email protected])

Reports EditorProfessorI.A.Stewart([email protected])

Reviews EditorProfessorD.Singerman([email protected])

Administrative EditorS.M.Oakes([email protected])

TypesetbytheLMSatDeMorganHouse;printedbyHolbrooksPrintersLtd.

Publishedmonthly,exceptAugust.Itemsandadver-tisementsbythefirstdayofthemonthpriortopubli-cation,ortheclosestprecedingworkingday.Noticesandadvertisementsarenotacceptedforeventsthatoccurinthefirstweekofthepublicationmonth.

News items and notices in theNewsletter may befreely used elsewhere unless otherwise stated, al-though attribution is requested when reproducingwhole articles. Contributions to theNewsletter aremadeunderanon-exclusive licence;please contacttheauthororphotographerfortherightstorepro-duce. The LMS cannot accept responsibility for theaccuracy of information in the Newsletter. ViewsexpresseddonotnecessarilyrepresenttheviewsorpolicyoftheLondonMathematicalSociety.

Charity registration number: 252660.

Editorial teamhttp://newsletter.lms.ac.uk

Publication dates and deadlines

Professor Series obtained her PhD fromHarvardUniversity in 1976 afterwhich shewas a lecturer at the University of Califor-niaBerkeley.ShethenreturnedtotheUKtothepositionofresearchfellowatNewnhamCollege, Cambridge. From 1978 she hasheldpositionsattheUniversityofWarwick.Professor Series’ research concernsintricate and fundamental questions aboutthe geometry of surfaces and 3-manifolds.Herworkhasbeenhighlyinfluentialinbothhyperbolicgeometryandsymbolicdynamics.Revealingtheirdeep links, ithashadappli-cations to ergodic theory andDiophantineapproximation,andwasaprecursor to thetheory of word hyperbolic and automaticgroups. More recently, Professor SeriesdevelopedanoriginalgeometricalapproachtounderstandingspacesofKleiniangroups.Besidesgroundbreakingresearch,shehascontributedextensivelytothemathematicalcommunitybothnationallyandinternation-ally. In particular, she has a distinguishedrecord in encouraging women mathemati-cians: as a founder member of EuropeanWomen in Mathematics, in initiating UKWomeninMathematicsDays,asChairoftheEuropeanMathematicalSociety’sWomeninMathematics Committee, Vice Chair of theIMUCommitteeforWomeninMathematics,andthroughherinvolvementinthefirstIn-ternational Conferences of WomenMathe-

maticiansandassociatedinitiatives.Shewasalso the first recipient of the Senior AnneBennettPrizeof theLMS in recognitionofherwork inmathematics and in particulartheadvancementofwomeninmathematics.In2016ProfessorSerieswaselectedaFellowofTheRoyalSociety(FRS).Professor Series’ notable contributionstotheworkoftheLMSincludeasChairofthe LMS Nominating Committee, CouncilMemberatLarge,InternationalMathemati-cal Union Representative, BMC CommitteeRepresentativeandChiefEditoroftheLMSStudent Texts. She was also the first MaryCartwrightLecturerin2000.Her work has also included membershipof the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE)PureMathematicssub-panel(2008)andtheResearchExcellenceFramework(REF)Math-ematicalSciencePanel(2014).Professor Series has also communicatedherresearchtoawideraudience,includingintheelegantpublicationIndra’s Pearlsandalsoasoneof the interviewees in the LMSfilmThinking Space,whichwasproducedaspart of the Society’s 150th Anniversary cel-ebrations in 2015. Professor Serieshas alsogivenpresentationsattheRoyalInstitutionand presented an LMS Popular Lecture in1999. She was also President of the Math-ematicalSection,BritishScienceAssociationin2011.


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LMS Items

ProfessorHitchinisaFellowoftheRoyalSociety and a long-standing memberof the London Mathematical Society,serving as its President from 1994-1996.He was also awarded the London Math-ematicalSociety’sPólyaPrizein2002.Hegaveakeynote talkat the launchof theSociety’s 150th Anniversary celebrationsat Goldmiths’ Hall, London, on Creativ-ity, Curiosity and Discovery where heexploredtheage-oldquestionofwhethermathematicsisinventedordiscovered.TheShawPrize isanannualaward firstpresented by the Shaw Prize Foundationin2004.Establishedin2002inHongKong,ithonourspeopleworkinginthefieldsofastronomy,lifescienceandmedicine,andmathematical sciences. The 2016 Shaw

PrizesareworthUS$1.2mtoeachwinner.ProfessorSimonTavaré,thecurrentLMSPresident, said ‘Nigel Hitchin is of oneof themost influential geometers of ourtime. The impact of hiswork in differen-tial and algebraic geometry is immenseand has stimulated development in awide variety of areas including mathe-maticalphysics.TheLMSisdelightedthatNigel, one of the Society's former Presi-dents,hasbeenhonouredwiththisjustlydeservedaward’.PresentationoftheShawPrize,awardedannually by the Shaw Prize Foundation,will be at a ceremony in September inHongKong.Further information is available at:http://tinyurl.com/hhha5p8.

PROfESSOR ALICE ROGERS RECEIVES OBE IN BIRTHDAY HONOuRSProfessor Alice Rogers,Emeritus Professor ofMathematics, King'sCollege, London, hasreceived an OBE inthe Queen’s BirthdayHonours list forservices toMathemat-ics Education andHigher Education.She is a leader in thefieldofgeometryandanalysis on supermanifolds andhasmade asubstantialcontributiontotheacademiclifeof King’s College London over the past 35years,bothasHeadofDepartmentandasanAdvancedResearchFellow.ProfessorRogershasgivenmanyyearsofservicetotheLondonMathematicalSociety,andtotheUKmathematicscommunityasawhole.HerservicefortheSocietycurrentlystands at 15 years, a number of whichhave been spent as a member of Counciland four as Vice President of the Society.

ProfessorRogershasgreatlycontributedtotwoimportantaspectsoftheSociety’swork.Firstly, Professor Rogers served as amemberof the LMSWomen inMathemat-icsCommitteebetween2000and2005,thelast three of those years as CommitteeChair. During this time she establishedthe promotion of opportunity for womeninmathematics as a central aspect of thisSociety’sbusiness.Sheputinplaceaseriesof events and activities aimed at encour-aging women academic mathematicians–many of these events still being in placetoday.ProfessorRogers’workhasreachedthousandsofwomenscientistsandhasen-couragedmanytocontinueinmathematicsresearch.Secondly, Professor Rogers has made asignificant rangeofcontributions tomath-ematics education. Since 2013, she hasservedtheSocietyintheroleofEducationSecretary. She is very highly regardedacross themathematicscommunityforherwork in the crucial area of mathematics


5Professor Tony Gardinerhas been named byTexas A&M Univer-sity as the recipient ofthe 2016 Excellence inMathematics EducationAward. During hiscareer in education,Professor Gardiner hasmade a significant con-tribution to enhancingthe problem-solving skills for mathematicsstudentsintheUKandaroundtheworld.He

education at secondary and tertiary leveland has led the Society’s education workwithdistinction,makingclearinterventionsinpolicymatterswithgovernment, takingforwardaprogrammeofactivityaimedatenhancing teacher professional develop-ment, and establishing an undergraduatesummerschool.On hearing the news LMS PresidentProfessor Simon Tavaré FRS said, "AliceRogers has worked with the broad math-ematics community andwith those at thehighest levelofUKgovernment inthefur-theranceofMathematicsSchoolandHigher

Educationandthisrewardisrichlydeserved.The LMS is delighted thatAlice's contribu-tionhasbeenrecognisedinthisway."In addition to her work for the Society,Professor Rogers has a long record ofservice to important organisations in UKmathematicaleducation.ShehassatontheJoint Mathematical Council, the AdvisoryCommitteeonMathematicalEducation,theCouncil fortheMathematicalSciencesandworkedwiththeQualityAssuranceAgency,in addition to being instrumental in es-tablishing and running the Kings CollegeLondonMathematicsSchool.

EXCELLENCE IN MATHEMATICS EDuCATION AWARD

hasbeeninstrumentalindevelopingaspectsoftheUKmathematicscurriculuminschoolsandhascontributedtotheworkofvariousmathematics organisations including asEducation Secretary of the London Math-ematicalSocietyandhecontinuestobeanLMS Council member and member of theEducation Committee. Professor Gardineralso helped to found the UK Mathemat-ics Trust and has served as Chair of theEducation Committee of the EuropeanMathematicalSociety. More informationisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/zc9nm96.


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LMS PRIZES 2016Thewinnersof theLMSPrizes for2016wereannouncedat theSocietymeetingonFriday8July2016.TheSocietyextendsitscongratulationstothesewinners,anditsthankstoallthenominators, referees andmembers of the Prizes Committee for their contributions to theCommittee’sworkthisyear.

DR KEISuKE HARA of Mynd Inc and PROfESSOR MASANORI HINOofKyotoUniversityarejointlyawardedaSenior Berwick PrizeinrecognitionoftheirpaperFrac-tionalOrderTaylor'sSeriesandtheNeo-ClassicalInequal-ity,Bull Lond Math Soc42(2010),467-477.

PROFESSOR SIR TIMOTHY GOWERS, FRS,of theUniversityofCambridgeisawardedaDe Morgan Medalforhisseminalcontributionstofunction-al analysis, additivenumber theory and combinatorics, aswell as for hisnumerousactivitiesonthenationalandinternationalmathematicalstages.

PROFESSOR DOMINIC JOYCE, FRS,oftheUniversityofOxfordisawardedaFröhlich Prizeforhisprofoundandwide-rangingcontributionstodifferen-tialandalgebraicgeometry.

DR AREND BAYERoftheUniversityofEdinburghisawardedaWhitehead Prizeforhisbreakthroughsinthestudyofstabilityconditionsonderivedcategoriesand theirassociatedmoduli spaces,and forhispioneeringap-plicationsofthisworktobirationalgeometry.

DR GuSTAV HOLZEGELofImperialCollegeLondonisawardedaWhitehead Prizeforhisworkonthecelebratedblackholestabilityproblemingeneralrelativity,especiallyhispioneeringpapersonasymptotically(anti)deSitterblackholes.

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The 2016 Collingwood Memorial Prize hasbeen awarded to Dillon Matthew Robert Reihill, Collingwood College, Durham Uni-versity.The Collingwood Memorial Prize, estab-

COLLINGWOOD MEMORIAL PRIZE

lishedinmemoryofSirEdwardCollingwoodFRS, President of the Society 1969-70, isawardedtoafinal-yearmathematicsstudentattheUniversityofDurhamwhointendstocontinuetoahigherdegreeinmathematics.

PROfESSOR DAMIR fILIPOVIĆ of the École Polytechnique Fédérale deLausanneandSwissFinanceInstituteisawardedaLouis Bachelier Prizefor his contributions to stochasticmodelling in finance and insurance.Filipović hasmade notable contributions to the study of interest ratemodels,thetheoryofaffineprocessesandthedesignofregulationforinsurancecompanies.

DR JuLIA WOLfoftheUniversityofBristolisawardedanAnne Bennett Prizeinrecognitionofheroutstandingcontributionstoadditivenumbertheory, combinatorics and harmonic analysis and to themathematicalcommunity.

DR CAROLA-BIBIANE SCHÖNLIEB of the University ofCambridge is awarded aWhitehead Prize for her spectacu-lar contributions to themathematics of image analysis andinverseimagingproblems.

DR JASON MILLERoftheUniversityofCambridgeisawardedaWhitehead Prizeforhislandmarkcontributionstothegeometricunderstandingofthetwo-dimensionalfreefield,anditsrelationtoSLEcurves.


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Evidence collected by the LMS from UKMathematicalSciencesdepartmentsappearsto support widespread concern in thecommunity that the change in the fundingmechanism between 2015 and 2016 wouldleadtoareductioninthenumberofPhDsinthemathematical sciences fundedbyEPSRC.At the time of writing, returns have beenreceivedfrom37departments,revealingthatDTP awards to these mathematical sciences departments have declined from 135 PhD scholarships starting in 2015, to 102 starting in 2016. This has resulted in a loss to themathematicalsciencesof33postdoctoralstu-dentshipsandalossoffundingamountingtomorethan£2million.Here is the background. EPSRC’s DoctoralTraining Partnerships (DTPs) constitute oneof the twomainmechanisms for thepublicfunding of UK PhDs in the mathematicalsciences, the other being via Centres forDoctoral Training (CDTs). For PhDs startingin autumn 2015 and earlier, the share-outofDTP funds for themathematical scienceswascarriedoutseparatelyfromthefundsfortheothersubjectsinEPSRC’sremit;fortheseothersubjects,analgorithmbasedoninstitu-tionallevelsofEPSRCgrantincomewasused,but it was recognised that this would notworkforthemathematicalsciences,becauseof the low overall level of grants going tomathematics. Instead, the allocations weredecided by a panel that considered casesmadebydepartments.Alistofthe45depart-ments receivingDTP awards formathemati-calsciencePhDsstartingin2015isathttps://www.epsrc.ac.uk/research/ourportfolio/themes/mathematics/introduction/train/dta/allocations/.For 2016 starts, however, the system waschanged:now,DTPfundsacrossallofEPSRC’sremitaresharedoutamonginstitutions,onatwo-yearlybasis,byasinglealgorithmbasedon total institutional grant income fromEPSRC.1Withtheaimofpreventingdamage

to mathematical sciences PhD training intheUKarisingfromthischange,universitieswere required to produce a Statement ofIntentdescribing interaliahowtheywouldsupportmathematical sciencesPhD training.Toaddresstheconsiderablescepticismaboutthe likely outcome of this process, PhilipNelson, Chief Executive of EPSRC, wrote alettertoinstitutionson15May2015inwhichhestated,2

“Given the changes to the process and rec-ognising the importance of the DTP for Mathematical Sciences, we will ask institu-tions to make particular reference to this subject in the Statement of Intent.”

TheStatementsofIntentwerereviewedbyanEPSRCPanel intheautumnof2015.The40institutionsinreceiptofEPSRCDTPfundsfor2016startsarelistedathttps://www.epsrc.ac.uk/newsevents/news/ministerdtpqt/.The online survey of departments wascarried out by the LMS inMarch and Aprilof2016,actingonbehalfoftheCouncil fortheMathematicalSciences(CMS)andmakinguse of the HoDoMS mailing list. Diggingbeneath the headline numbers displayedabove, a more detailed breakdown of theemerging pattern of the apparent 25% cutinDTP-fundedPhDplacesisevidentfromthescatterplot3onthepageopposite.EachpointontheplotrepresentstheDTP-fundedEPSRCPhDplacesinmathematicalsciencesforade-partmentin2015and2016,thoughofcourseoneshouldbearinmindthatthereanumberof “multiple points” where several depart-ments returned identical data. The scatterplotmakesclearthatthereductionisbeingpredominantly suffered by smaller depart-ments.Ifuncheckedthiswillleadtoafurtherconcentration of resources in a diminishingand geographically concentrated group ofinstitutions, resulting in a serious reductionin the availability of mathematical sciencesexpertise across the UK higher education

EPSRC’S DOCTORAL TRAINING PARTNERSHIPS AND THE MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES


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sector and thereby to associated industry,enterpriseandcommerce.Particularly striking is the plight of thosefive mathematical science departmentswhich receivedaDTPaward for2015 starts,but whose institution received no DTPaward at all for 2016 starts. This happenedbecause the new EPSRC algorithm imposesaminimum thresholdof institutional EPSRCgrantfunding,withtheseuniversitiesfallingbelowthatlevel.Theuniversitiesinquestioncanbereadofffromtheweblistsmentionedabove: they are East Anglia, Kent, Leicester,the Open University and Royal Holloway.Together, they have lost at least 11 mathe-maticalsciencesPhDscholarships,theirEPSRCmathematical sciences PhD funding disap-pearingsimplybecauseoftherelativelylowinvolvementoftheseinstitutionsintheotherEPSRCsubjects.At the institutional level, a number of de-partments are using alternative sources topartially counter theeffectsof the shortfallin DTP funds. In some cases, additionalinstitutional funding has been provided,although several Department Headsexpressedstrongdoubtsaboutwhetherthiswould be sustained in the medium term.Severaldepartmentsindicatedthattheyareusing departmental funds to create one ormore Graduate Teaching Posts, where theappointed candidate carries on research foraPhDwhileteachingundergraduatecourses,

typicallyoveralongerperiodthanastandardPhD.Whatare the concerns? (i)A reductionofapproximatelyaquarter inDTPPhDawardsin the mathematical sciences represents amassivecutinmathematicalsciencestrainingsupportbyEPSRC,anarea recognised–notleastbytheEPSRCitself4 -asbeingofhugeimportance to the economic and scientificsuccess of theUK. It is clear that the letterfromPhilipNelsonhasfailedtoachievethedesiredeffect.(ii) Theeffecton the5departments listedabove,whichhavelostallDTPfundingsimplybecause their universities are insufficientlyactiveinotherEPSRC-supportedfields,ispar-ticularlystarkandpotentiallyverydamaging.Intotalthesedepartmentshavelost11DTP-fundedPhDplacesascomparedto2015.Thisis a further concentration of resources in asmaller set of institutions, a process whichovertimeisliabletoreducethecurrentwidegeographicspreadofexcellenceinthemath-ematical sciences across the UK’s academiclandscape,whichwillaffectnotjustacademiabut also industry, enterprise and commercethroughouttheUK.(iii) The new algorithm has resulted in a

loss to the mathematical sciences of 33 postdoctoral studentships and converselyhas resulted in a gain to the other sciencedisciplines at the expense of mathematicalsciences.(iv)MathematicalsciencesattractstheleastamountoffundingofalloftheEPSRCdisci-plinesandhasnowsufferedafurther loss of funding amounting to more than £2million.Whatistheway forward?Atanationallevel,theCMS, includingboththeLMSandotherlearnedsocieties,willbemakingstrongrep-resentationstoEPSRCregardingwhatoppor-tunitiesexisttoaddresstheanomaliesraisedabovewithregardtothenewDTPalgorithmand,toassurethefuturehealthofthepeoplepipeline, how the associated funding nowlost to themathematical sciences disciplinecanberestoredintheshortandlongerterms.Comments and suggestions are welcome,in letters to the Newsletter, posts on the

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LMS blog, or – if you prefer – privately tome. I also urge everyonewho is concernedaboutthesituationtojoininusingwhatevercontacts they have at EPSRC to argue foraction to improve the situation. The frus-tration expressed in their survey returns bymanyDepartmentHeads,deservesaseriousresponsefromtheEPSRC.

KenBrownLMSVicePresident

1Fordetails,seehttps://www.epsrc.ac.uk/skills/students/dta/grants/.Toquotefromthere:“ThealgorithmisbasedonacomprehensiveprofileofEPSRCresearchgrantsandfellowships.Othertraininggrants(CDTs,previousDTPsandIndustrialCASE)remainoutsidethecalculation.Largecapitalandinstitutionalawards,suchasImpactAccelerationAccounts,arealsoexcluded.”2http://tinyurl.com/jqs5gs93ThankstoPeterDiggle(Lancaster)forthis.4Seee.g.theDeloittereport,http://tinyurl.com/hhdgx3y,andtheCMSleaflet,http://tinyurl.com/hfj2pep

ThisdiaryentrycoverstwoCouncilmeetings:oneheld1Aprilandthenext20May.Asusual,Council’sfirstitemofbusiness,apartfromthestandardapprovalofminutes,etc.,istoreceivean update on the activities of the President.Highlights included attending the FebruarySocietyMeeting incorporating Gwyneth Stal-lard’sMaryCartwrightLecture,andtheBritishMathematical Colloquium in Bristol, as wellas various meetings aimed at furthering col-laborationsbetweentheRoyalSocietyandtheLMS. The President also convened meetingsof the Council’s Strategic Sub-Group, taskedwithreviewingstrategicprioritiesforCouncilandplanningCouncil’s2017StrategicRetreat,and informed Council that LMS Representa-tiveswouldbecontactedtoinvitesuggestionsformatterstheCouncilmightconsiderattheRetreat. ThePresident also informedCouncilthat the Presidential Search Committee hasidentifiedhissuccessor,tobeannouncedattheSocietyMeetingon8July2016andappearsonthefrontpageofthisLMS Newsletter.The General Secretary updated Council ontheNewsletterReview;afterextensiveconsul-tationwithRepresentatives,theReviewGrouphasproposedvariouschangestocontentandformat, as well as combining the Newslet-terEditorialBoardwiththeWebsiteEditorialBoard.Councilagreedthatcostingsshouldbeprovidedbeforeanydecisionsweretaken.Inordertokeepthingsmovinginthemeantime,

the General Secretary will informally seeksuitable candidates for the role of Editor-in-Chief.Vice-President Brown provided updates onthe work of the Research Policy Committee.Aparticular itemofnotewasasurveyofUKmathematical sciences departments under-takentoestablishthedistributionofDoctoralTrainingGrantfundingwithindepartments.Amoredetailedarticleappearsonpages8–9ofthisLMS Newsletter,andwillbecirculatedtoHeads of Departments of Mathematics andto LMS Representatives. Council agreed thiswasamatterofgreatconcern,andexpressedgratitude to the Committee for undertakingtheimportantworkofdata-gatheringanddis-seminationofresultstoCMSandEPSRC.Other activities of note included theagreement of Prizes and Prize Citations for2016, introduction of Operational Plansand Priorities for 2016-17 (that is, budgetplanning), and an update on the LMSMath-ematicalSciencesDirectoryUKproject.CouncilalsodiscussedaproposalbyAlinaVdovinaforsupportofmathematicianswithoutacademicaffiliation, includingretireesandearlycareerpeople seeking positions; Council agreedthat this isan importantactivity thatwillbetakenforwardbyVdovinaandtheExecutiveSecretaryandbroughtbackforfurtherdiscus-sion.

TaraBrendle

LMS COuNCIL DIARY1 April and 20 May 2016: A personal view

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LMS NEWS FOR UNDERGRADUATES, MASTERS STUDENTS, PHD STUDENTS, POST-DOCS AND EARLY CAREER RESEARCHERS

POST-DOCS AND EARLY CAREER RESEARCHERS

Date for your diary: 15 September 2016ApplicationdeadlineforResearchGrants.• Haveyourecentlybeenappointedtoyourfirstpositionsasanewlecturer?Whynothostascientificmeetingtocelebratethisimportantmilestoneinyourcareer.Grantsofup to £600areavailablefromtheLMSCelebratingNewAppointmentsscheme:www.lms.ac.uk/grants/cele-brating-new-appointments-scheme-1

• Planningaresearchvisitwithyourcollabo-rator?ApplytotheLMSforsupportofup to £1,200fromaResearchinPairsGrant(Scheme4).Furtherdetailsonline:www.lms.ac.uk/grants/research-pairs-scheme-4

• TheLMSalsorunsothergrantschemes.Formoreinformation,visitwww.lms.ac.uk/[email protected].

PhD STuDENTSDate for your diary: 15 September 2016Application deadline for Postgraduate Con-ference Grants (Scheme 8). Thinking of or-ganising your own UK conference for yourpeers?Apply to the LMS for support ofup to £4,000. Further details online: www.lms.

ac.uk/grants/postgraduate-research-confer-ence-grants-scheme-8.

MASTERS STuDENTSDate for your diary: 15-16 December 2016The next LMS Prospects in Mathemat-ics Meeting will be held in York. Fur-ther details will be available in duecourse and online: www.lms.ac.uk/events/lms-prospects-mathematics-meeting.

uNDERGRADuATESFunding for Undergraduate Society MeetingsFundsofup to £500areavailabletosupportmeetings of Undergraduate MathematicalSocietiestocoverthetravelandaccommoda-

tioncostsforaninvitedspeaker(fromacademia or industry) and to covercatering costs e.g. a wine receptionafter the meeting. Further informa-tion and an application form is avail-able online: www.lms.ac.uk/grants/LMS-Funding-Undergrad-Soc-Meetings.

Date for your diary: 15-16 December 2016ThenextLMSProspectsinMathematicsMeetingwillbeheld inYork. Furtherdetailswill be available in due courseand online: www.lms.ac.uk/events/lms-prospects-mathematics-meeting.


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News

EuROPEAN NEWSECM 2016Areminderthatthe7thEuropean Congress of Mathematics takes place in Berlin from18to22July:foralldetailsseewww.7ecm.de/home.html. The official registrationdeadline has passed (over 1,300 partici-pants have already enrolled) but you canstillregisterifyoudonotmindyournamebeingabsentfromtheCongressdocumenta-tion.TheCongressisprecededbyameetingof the Council of the EMS, at which newmembers of the Executive Committee andtwonewVice-Presidentsare tobeelected,anda votewill be takenon the choiceofvenue for ECM 2020: Sevilla (Spain) orPortorož(Slovenia).

New ERCOM membersCongratulations to two new membersfrom Spain of ERCOM (EuropeanResearch Centres on Mathematics): BCAM(Basque Center for Applied Mathemat-ics) Bilbao, www.bcamath.org and ICMAT(Instituto de CienciasMatemáticas)Madrid,www.icmat.es.

CSASC 2016This conference will take place from 20to23 September2016at Institutd'EstudisCatalans in Barcelona. CSASC is a jointmeetingof theCzech, Slovenian,Austrian,SlovakandCatalanmathematical societies.Forinformationseecsasc2016.espais.iec.cat.

Spanish Society of Applied Mathematics (SeMA)ThisyearSeMAcelebratesits25thbirthday:see www.sema.org.es. The SeMA Journal hasawardedthetitleofBestPaper2016to'Apriorierrorestimateofamultiscalefiniteelement method for transport modeling'by Franck Ouaki, Grégoire Allaire, SylvainDesroziers and Guillaume Enchéry, andSeMAhasawardedthetitleofBest Young Researcher in Applied Mathematics in Spain 2016 to Juan Calvo (Universitat PompeuFabra).

A new journal edited in Spain aims topublishworks inappliedmathematicsandits applications to nonlinear sciences. Seehttp://tinyurl.com/zreyra2.

Raising Public Awareness Committee (RPAC)The website Mathematics-in-Europe, aportal of the Raising Public Awareness (RPA) committee of the EMS, has recentlybeenrenewedasamagazine,witharticles,interviews, news, stories, and many othersections, making it easy for people of allbackgrounds to read about the ubiquityandbeautyofmathematics. Thenewwebpageiswww.mathematics-in-europe-eu.

EMS Newsletter No. 100The 100th News-letter of theEMS is onlineat http://tinyurl.c o m / j w 5 g y c 5 .It includes aneditorial byPresident PavelExnerwitharticlesand mathematicalsurveys from theEMS’s 25th anni-versary celebra-tion on 22October 2015 in Paris. YouwillfindasurveyaboutBitcoinandcryptology,atributetoAbbasBahriandhismathematicalwork,plusanhistoricalarticleonBeppoLevi,as well as a presentation (first of a series)from the archives of the Istituto per le Ap-plicazioni di Calcolo 'Mauro Picone'inRome,amongmanyotherinterestingtopics.

EMS Publishing HouseTheEMS-PHhasrecentlypublishedMeasure and IntegrationbyDietmarA.Salamon.Fordetails and more information about thePublishingHousewww.ems-ph.org.

DavidChillingworthLMS/EMSCorrespondent


13

RESEARCH

Chair of EPSRC Minister for Universities and Science JoJohnson has announced that Dr Paul GolbyhasbeenreappointedasChairofEPSRC.Thereappointment is from 1April 2016 for twoyears.Moreinformationisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/z9ylxb7.

HIGHER EDuCATIONGovernment Higher Education White PaperThiswhitepapersetsoutarangeofreformstothehighereducationandresearchsystem.InsomecasestheseplansaresubjecttoParlia-ment.Moreinformationisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/z23uswz.

STEM degree provision and graduate employability: Wakeham reviewThis independent review by Sir WilliamWakehamlooksattheemploymentsituationamong STEM graduates and the role of ac-creditationofcourses.Thereviewfocusesonthe skills requirements of employers, howSTEMgraduates’ skillsandknowledgerelateto labourmarketdemand,andhowexistingaccreditationsystemssupportthis.TheReviewisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/jjarypu.

Teaching Excellence Framework: year 2 - technical consultation This consultation is seeking views on thedetailed proposals for the operation of theTeachingExcellence Framework (TEF) in year2,including:• howtheTEFwillassessteachingexcellence;• thecriteriathatwilldefineteachingexcellence;

• howjudgementsaboutexcellencewillbemade,includingtheevidencebaseanduseofcoremetrics;and

• howTEFoutcomeswillbecommunicated.The consultation closes on 12 July 2016.Moreinformationisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/zc5r6dz.

Higher Education and Research BillThe government pub-lishedon19May2016its Higher EducationandResearchBill,intro-ducing new legislationto give more youngpeopletheopportunityto access high-qualityuniversity educationand boost life chancesand opportunity forall. Itwillenact the reforms in thewhitepa-per, Success as aKnowledgeEconomy.Moreinformation is availableathttp://tinyurl.com/hfvycwn.

SCHOOLS AND COLLEGESMaking education your business: A practical guide to supporting STEM teaching in schools and collegesApracticalguidelaunchedbytheRoyalSocietyandCBIsays‘thattosupportscience,technol-ogy, engineering and mathematics (STEM)educationintheUKbusinessesneedtocollab-oratewithteachers.Withmostyoungpeopleattributing their decision to pursue STEMsubjects to an inspirational teacher,workingwith teachers is the best way to secure theUK’sfutureSTEMworkforce’. Moreinforma-tionisavailableathttp://tinyurl.com/h2m3cte.

Scottish Survey of Literacy and NumeracySchool students in Scotland are doing lesswell in maths according to Scottish govern-ment figures. Between 2013 and 2015, theproportionofP4andS2studentsperforming‘well or very well’ fell. The statistics featurein the latest Scottish Survey of Literacy andNumeracy (SSLN)which is an annual samplemonitoring national performance of schoolchildren at P4, P7 and S2 in literacy andnumeracy.Thesurveyisavailableatwww.gov.scot/Resource/0050/00500749.pdf.

DrJohnJohnstonJointPromotionofMathematics

Making education your businessA practical guide to supporting STEM teaching in schools and colleges

MATHEMATICS POLICY ROuND-uPJune 2016


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MINICOURSES

SPEAKERS

Organisers: Alessio Martini and Andrew Morris (Birmingham)

Kaj NyströmUppsala Universitet

Pascal AuscherUniversité ParisSud

Tony CarberyUniversity of Edinburgh

Martin DindošUniversity of Edinburgh

Dorothee FreyDelft University of Technology

Sylvie MonniauxAixMarseille Université

Fulvio RicciScuola Normale Superiore

Javier ParcetInstituto de Ciencias Matemáticas

Charles BattyUniversity of Oxford

Andrea CarbonaroUniversità degli Studi di Genova

Véronique FischerUniversity of Bath

José María MartellInstituto de Ciencias Matemáticas

Detlef MüllerChristianAlbrechtsUniversität zu Kiel

Maria VallarinoPolitecnico di Torino

LLMMSS MMiiddllaannddss RReeggiioonnaall MMeeeettiinnggaanndd WWoorrkksshhoopp oonn

IInntteerraaccttiioonnss ooffHHaarrmmoonniicc AAnnaallyyssiiss aanndd

OOppeerraattoorr TThheeoorryyBBiirrmmiinngghhaamm,, 11331166 SSeepptteemmbbeerr 22001166

http://web.mat.bham.ac.uk/lmsmidlands2016/

Jim WrightUniversity of Edinburgh


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1865 - 2015

LMS Popular Lectures 2016

BIRMINGHAM (University of Birmingham) 21st September 18:30

Heather Harrington (University of Oxford) - The shape of data in biology - In recent years, areas of pure mathematics (maths for maths’ sake) such as algebra, geometry and topology, are being applied to problems in biology. Dr Harrington will describe how to understand living systems using cutting-edge mathematics.Julia Wolf (University of Bristol) - One, Two, Red, Blue - Ever wondered why Noughts and crosses always results in a draw? In this talk Dr Wolf will explore the surprisingly deep mathematics behind this popular game and its variants.

Commences at 6.30 pm, refreshments at 7.30 pm, ends at 9.00pm Admission is free, with ticket. Register by Thursday 15 September.

To register for tickets, please use the online registration facility at: www.lms.ac.uk/events/popular-lectures.

The London Mathematical Society is the UK’s learned society for mathematics. Founded in 1865 for the promotion and extension of mathematical knowledge, the Society has a membership of over 2500 drawn from all parts of the UK and overseas. Its principal activities are the organisation of meetings and conferences, publication of journals and books, provision of financial support for mathematical activities, and contribution to public debates on issues related to mathematics, research and education.London Mathematical Society, De Morgan House, 57-58 Russell Square, London WC1B 4HS. Tel +44 (0)20 7637 3686; Fax: +44 (0)20 7323 3655; Email: [email protected]; Web: www.lms.ac.uk; Registered charity no. 252660


16

News

DISCOVERING THE BEAuTY Of MATHEMATICS AT THE CHELSEA fLOWER SHOWIhadalreadydecidedtovisitChelseaFlowerShowthisyearwithmyson,David,akeengardener.WhenIheardviaTwitteraboutWinton Capital’s Beauty of Mathemat-ics Garden (#BeautyofMathematics), Iwaseven more excited by the outing. Davidwasalittlelessenthusedbythisnews,butdid at least agree to see this garden first,although if he hoped thiswould stopmetalkingaboutmathematics for the restofthe visit it didn’t quite have the desiredeffect.The idea of a garden celebrating thebeauty of mathematics is a delightfulthought for any mathematician who hasa passion for gardening. This garden,designed by Nick Bailey, Head Gardener

at Chelsea Physic Garden, won a well-deserved Silver Gilt award. According toNick, every plant is driven by mathemati-calalgorithmsandalgorithmsarealsousedbyWintonCapitalsothisgardenembodieseverything that is plants and everythingthatisWinton.Thereareaseriesofvideosexplaining some of the ideas behind thegardenonWintonCapital’swebsite:www.wintoncapital.com/en/about-us/sponsor-ship/co-chelsea-flower-show.Thecentralfeatureofthegardenisamag-nificentcoppercurve,representingbothanemergingseedlingandtheFibonaccispiral.It is elaborately etched with equationswhichareilluminatedatnight.Howeverit is the planting that I found most at-

CentrepointofWintongarden–roomunderthecentreoftheFibonacciSpiral


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INTRODuCTION TO THE DEuTSCHE MATHEMATIKER-VEREINIGuNG (German Mathematical Society)

The Deutsche Mathematiker-Vereinigung(DMV), founded 125 years ago in Bremen,represents and works for the interests ofmathematics and of mathematicians inGermany. It promotes research, teaching,applications, aswell as national and inter-nationalexchangeofideasandexperiences.It organizes and supports mathematicalevents,activities,andinitiatives.DMVhaslauncheditsactiveMedia Office as well as aNetwork Office Schools–Uni-versities following the extremely success-ful National ‘Year of Mathematics 2008’

that was co-sponsored and co-organizedbyDMV.Bothofficesare locatedatFreieUniversität Berlin, directed by Günter M.Ziegler.On this basis,DMVpromotes theinterests of mathematics in educationand research policies, in schools and inacademia: It tries to enhance the publicawareness and image of mathematics,but italsoactivelyworksonpolicy issues,such as structural and curricula reforms.Among many projects, it organizes twopublic Gauß Lectures each year, as wellas its annual national meeting, the

tractive. Theplantshavebeenchosenfortheirsymmetry.Therearelupins,irisesandleucospermums to provide colour as wellas pattern, and several spiky plants suchas banksi integrifolia and yucca rostrata.Howevermy favourite plantwas thealoe polyphyllawhichcomesfromSouthAfrica.Thisplant ismadeupof severalbeautifulspirals echoing themain copper Fibonaccispiral.Mirroringthespiralsinthisplantisan exquisite copperwater feature on theothersideofthemainpath,whichprovidesanotherfocalpointinthegarden.WhilstIexpectedthatIwouldthoroughlyappreciate the mathematical symbolismof this garden, I was surprised by thenumerous positive comments from othervisitorswhowerepresumably lessfamiliarwith themathematics represented. Apartfrommyson’scomments,Ididn’thearanyoftheusualmutteringsaboutthesupposedirrelevanceofmathematicsorpeople’slackofenjoymentofthesubjectthattoooftencomeupwhenthe‘Mword’ ismentionedinfrontofnon-mathematicians.As we moved around the Flower ShowI realised that there was mathematicsin several other gardens and exhibits at

Chelsea,albeitimplicitratherthanexplicit.Forexample theeccentricHarrodsgardendesigned by Diarmuid Gavin would haveneededmathematicalphysics toworkoutthe speed of the turning bay trees andbobbing box-hedge balls to make surethat they were synchronised with eachother, and theWorldVisiongarden couldbe described as a collection of cosine orsinewavesalthoughIamnotsurethatthedesigner,JohnWarland,wasawareofthemathematics.BothofthesegardenswerealsoSilverGiltawardwinners.At theendofourvisitwesawtheartistAdrianGraydemonstratingtheartofstonebalancing.Thiswasabsolutelyremarkable,andwhilemysonwentofftotalktoAdrianabout photography I was left wonderinghowAdrianfoundthecentreofgravityofthe stones, and the mathematics behindthisamazingskill.Nextyear,evenifthereisnotadesignat-edmathematicalgarden, I am sure thatavisit toChelsea in searchofmathematicalideas in gardendesignwill be equally de-lightful.

Noel-AnnBradshawUniversityofGreenwich


18

News

FoundersoftheDMV

Jahrestagung. Its school activities includeDMV Abiturpreis (an award offered foran excellent mathematics graduate ateach high-school in Germany), theMath-ematical Advent Calendar (a web-basedcompetition at www.mathe-im-advent.dewith far more than 100,000 participantseach year from more than 50 countries).It is onlinewith thewebsiteswww.math-ematik.de anddmv.mathematik.de. Everysecond year it awardsDMV Media Prizesforoutstandingjournalismonmathemati-caltopicswithpublicimpact.DMVhasabout5,000personalmembers,mostofthematUniversitiesandResearchInstitutes,butitalsohasandinvitesmem-bership from industry and from schools.Local DMV representatives are active atmost universities across Germany. Specialinterest groups (Fachgruppen) organizeactivities in various mathematical fields;for example, the Fachgruppe Discrete Mathematics organizes a Symposiumand awards theRichard Rado Prize everysecondyear.DMV produces three major publica-tions: The full-color Notices of the DMV,Mitteilungen der DMV, is a magazine ofgeneralinterestthatappearsfourtimesayear. The Jahresbericht has been publish-ing surveys aswell as high-level researchcontributions since1890 – it startedwith

a paper on set theory by Georg Cantor.Documenta Mathematica is a 100% freeopen-access journal started by DMV in1996,twentyyearsago.DMVwasfoundedin1890,basedonthemathematicssectionoftheGermanSocietyofScientistsandDoctorsfoundedin1822.The first president was Georg Cantor. Inhis honour, DMV bi-annually awards theCantor Medalforoutstandingmathemati-cal accomplishments. Later presidentsincluded Felix Klein (1897), DavidHilbert(1900),HermannWeyl(1932)andFriedrichHirzebruch(1962,1990).In1990theDMVunited with the Mathematical Society ofthe German Democratic Republic. TodayDMV’smainoffice is located in theheartofBerlin.DMVrepresentsGermanyintheEuropeanMathematicalSociety(EMS)andin the International Mathematical Union(IMU). Itmaintains contacts with foreignmathematical societies – in particular, ithas a Reciprocity agreement with theLondonMathematicalSociety.Jointlywiththe IMU,DMVawards theGauß Prize for Applications of Mathematics every fouryears on occasion of the InternationalCongressofMathematicians(ICM).

RobertWöstenfeld,DMVNetworkOfficeSchools–Universities

GünterM.Ziegler,memberofthegoverningboard(Präsidium)ofDMV


19

THE AMERICAN MATHEMATICAL SOCIETY

TheAmericanMathematicalSociety(AMS),founded in1888, isanon-profitmember-ship organization that promotes interestand research in mathematics through itspublications,meetings,programs,services,advocacy, and outreach activities. TheAMS has approximately 30,000 membersworldwide and offices in Rhode Island,Michigan,andWashington,DC.Through our Publications Division, weare a leading publisher of mathemat-ics research, producing approximately 80bookseachyear,sixteenscholarlyjournals,and MathSciNet, the premier onlinegateway to the world’s mathematical lit-erature.

AMS BooksThe AMS publishes one of the mostrespected collections of mathematicalliterature in the world. The AMS BookProgram began with our Colloquiumseries, which has its roots in the famous1894 lectures of Felix Klein. Mathemati-cal Surveys followed, as well as confer-ence proceedings, volumes from summerworkshops, and regular translations, es-pecially fromRussia. TheAMShas addedadditional monograph and copublica-tion series (including Graduate Studiesin Mathematics, Student MathematicalLibrary, Clay Mathematics, and CourantLectureNotes).

AMS JournalsAMS peer-reviewed journals are of thehighest quality inmathematical research.Our journals have been published since1891 and cover a broad range of math-ematics. In addition to its own journals,the Society publishes several translat-ed journals and distributes a numberof journals for mathematical societiesaroundtheworld.

Mathematical Reviews/MathSciNetSince 1940,Mathematical Reviews® (MR)

hasservedresearchersandscholarsinthemathematicalsciencesbyprovidingtimelyinformation on peer-reviewed articlesand books. MathSciNet®, the electronicversionofMR,presentsafullysearchabledatabase with many tools designed tohelp navigate the mathematical sciencesliterature,including:• reviewswrittenbyacommunityofexperts;

• bibliographiclistingsdatingbacktotheearly1800s;

• linkstoarticles,journals,andpublishers;

• linkedreferencelists;• citationinformationonarticles,books,andjournals.

The AMS and the LMSThe American Mathematical Societyhas enjoyed a history of warm relationswith the London Mathematical Society,beginning in 1888,whenAmericanmath-ematicianThomasFiske, inspiredbyvisitstomeetingsof theLondonMathematicalSociety,proposedthecreationoftheNewYork Mathematical Society (which wouldlaterevolveintotheAMS).Today, the twosocieties continue tocol-laborate on publishing projects and alsomaintain reciprocal membership agree-ments, allowingmembersofeach societyto enjoy the benefits of membership intheotheratareducedrate.FormoreinformationontheAMSanditspublicationprogram,visitwww.ams.org.

RobertM.Harington,D.Phil.AssociateExecutiveDirector,Publishing


20

FURTHER INFORMATION:Tel: +44 (0)20 7240 0856Fax: +44 (0)20 7379 0609Email: [email protected]

CUSTOMER SERVICES:Tel: +44 (0)1767 604972Fax: +44 (0)1767 601640Email: [email protected]

THE CASE OF ACADEMICIAN NIKOLAI NIKOLAEVICH LUZINEdited by Sergei S. Demidov, Russian Academy of Sciences & Boris V. LëvshinTranslated by Roger Cooke

A campaign to “Sovietize” mathematics in the USSR in 1936 was launched with an attack on Nikolai Nikolaevich Luzin, the leader of the Soviet school of mathematics, in Pravda. Luzin was fortunate in that only a few of the most ardent ideologues wanted to destroy him utterly. As a result, Luzin, though humiliated and frightened, was allowed to make a statement of public repentance and then let off with a relatively mild reprimand. The present book contains the transcripts of five meetings of the Academy of Sciences commission charged with investigating the accusations against Luzin.

History of Mathematics, Vol. 43

Jul 2016 386pp 9781470426088 Hardback £95.95

GALLERY OF THE INFINITERichard Evan Schwartz, Brown University

A mathematician's unique view of the infinitely many sizes of infinity. Written in a playful yet informative style, it introduces important concepts from set theory (including the Cantor Diagonalization Method and the Cantor-Bernstein Theorem) using colourful pictures, with little text and almost no formulas.

Sep 2016 187pp 9781470425579 Paperback £25.50

Free delivery worldwide at eurospanbookstore.com/ams

AMS is distributed by Eurospan|group


21

1865 - 2015

Society Meeting & Reception

At the 7ECM, Berlin, GermanyThursday 21 July 2016

Lecture Theatre, Main Building, TU Berlin

4.30 Opening of the meeting, Terry Lyons (Oxford) From Hopf Algebras to Machine learning via Rough Paths

Rough path theory aims to build an effective calculus that can model the interactions between complex oscillatory (rough) evolving systems. At its mathematical foundations, it is a combination of analysis blended with algebra that goes back to LC Young, and to KT Chen. Key to the theory is the essential need to incorporate additional non-commutative structure into areas of mathematics we thought were stable. At its high points, there are the regularity structures of Martin Hairer that allow robust meaning to be given to numerous core nonlinear stochastic pdes describing evolving interfaces in physics.

Classic results, by Clark, Cameron and Dickinson, demonstrate that a nonlinear approach to the data is essential. Rough path theory lives up to this challenge and can be viewed as providing fundamentally more efficient ways of approximately describing complex data; approaches that, after penetrating the basic ideas, are computationally tractable and lead to new scalable ways to regress, classify, and learn functional relationships from data. One non-mathematical application that is already striking is the use of signatures on a daily basis in the online recognition of Chinese Handwriting on mobile phones.

6.00 Reception (Ticket required)

LMS members will have the opportunity to sign the Membership Book which dates back to 1865.For a ticket to the reception, please email Elizabeth Fisher ([email protected])

The London Mathematical Society is the UK’s learned society for mathematics. Founded in 1865 for the promotion and extension of mathematical knowledge, the Society has a membership of over 2500 drawn from all parts of the UK and overseas. Its principal activities are the organisation of meetings and conferences, publication of journals and books, provision of financial support for mathematical activities, and contribution to public debates on issues related to mathematics, research and education.London Mathematical Society, De Morgan House, 57-58 Russell Square, London WC1B 4HS. Tel +44 (0)20 7637 3686; Fax: +44 (0)20 7323 3655; Email: [email protected]; Web: www.lms.ac.uk; Registered charity no. 252660


22

Reports

THE DAVID CRIGHTON MEDALReport

The 2015 IMA-LMS David CrightonMedalwasawardedtoProfessorFrankKelly,CBE,FRS,HonFIMA,atTheRoyalSocietyon12May2016.The audience of IMA members, LMSmembersandinvitedguestswaswelcomedby the President of the IMA, ProfessorChris Linton, CMath FIMA,who remindedthe audience that the David CrightonMedal was instituted in 2002 in memoryof Professor David Crighton, who wasPresident of the IMA and President-desig-nateoftheLMS.Professor Simon Tavaré, FRS FIMA, LMSPresident, then introduced Frank Kelly,reading the citation below and introduc-ing Frank’s talkwith theobservation thatFrank has always had a way of makingverydifficultthingsseemverysimple.Thecitationreads:FrankKellyisawardedtheDavidCrightonMedaloftheLondonMathematicalSocietyand the Institute of Mathematics and itsApplications for services both to mathe-maticsandtothemathematicalcommunity.Kelly’sworkonthefundamentalproperties

ofcommunicationnetworkshashaddirectapplication to the design of telephonenetworks and internet protocols. The im-portance and impact of his work morebroadlyisreflectedinthelargenumberofcitationshispapers receive, togetherwiththe award of international prizes. He istheHeadofaCambridgecollege,andhaschaired groups working to improve chil-dren’s experience ofmathematics. He hasbeen Chief Scientific Adviser to the Gov-ernment (Department for Transport) andchaired the Council for the Mathemati-cal Sciences at an important time for themathematics community. He was electeda Fellowof theRoyal Society in1989andawardedaCBEin2013.ProfessorFrankKellybeganhisengaginglecture by remembering how well-lovedDavid Crighton was at Cambridge andshowing us some photos at www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/about/dgc/.The lecture, Mathematics and Financial

Markets, centred around a simple and an-alytically tractablemodel of a limit orderbook that Frank developed with Elena

SimonTavarépresentstheawardtoFrankKelly

FrankKelly SimonTavaré,FrankKellyandChrisLinton(ltor)

©JohnMeeson,IMAAssistantDirector ©JohnMeeson,IMAAssistantDirector ©JohnMeeson,IMAAssistantDirector


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Yudovina (http://arxiv.org/abs/1504.00579).Frank suggested that this simple modelcouldbeusedtogain insight intotradingstrategies and allow regulators (andsociety)todecidewhichtradingbehavioursthey would like to encourage. Frank alsonoted that many mathematics graduatesare traders, but few are regulators andsuggested that the market needs more

advancedmathematics(notless)asisoftensuggestedafterthe2008financialcrash.AfterthelectureChrisLintonthankedthespeaker for an excellent talk that demon-stratedhowasimplemathematicalmodelcanhaverealworldapplications.

RebeccaWatersIMAEditorialOfficerMathematicsToday

CECIL KING TRAVEL SCHOLARSHIP Report

IusedtheCecilKingTravelScholarshiptotravel to visit Sheehan Olver at the Uni-versity of Sydney for threemonths fromJanuary to April 2016. We worked onsomeproblemsincomputationalspectraltheory and related problems in orthogo-nalpolynomials.The first outcome of my research wasthat the so-called connection coefficientmatrix,whichisthechangeofbasismatrixbetween two families of orthogonalpolynomials, is ausefulnew tool for thespectral theoryof the Jacobioperators. IprovedthatforJacobioperatorsthatareafiniterankperturbationofToeplitz,the

connection ceofficients matrices providean explicit, computable formula for thespectralmeasure.We also investigated the infinite di-mensional QL algorithm, which allowedus to formulate a method of transform-ingtheseJacobioperatorstoacanonicalformandimplementafunctionalcalculus.Wewereable to store thesehighly struc-tured infinite dimensional matrices infinite memory and perform the opera-tionswithoutlosingthatinformation:itisan early example of truly infinite dimen-sionalnumericallinearalgebra.Alex Townsend (MIT) also visited

Sheehan for three weeks inFebruary.Wediscoveredthatthe connection coefficientmatrix for Jacobi polynomi-als with different param-eters can be decomposedusing Hadamard products ofToeplitzandHankelmatrices,leadingtoanewclassoffastpolynomialtransforms.I am very grateful to theLondonMathematicalSocietyand the Cecil King Founda-tion for not only giving mean opportunity to developas a researcher, but also toescapetheBritishwinter.

MarcusWebbUniversityofCambridge

MarcusWebb

©MarcusWebb


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THE DYNAMICS Of COMPLEX SYSTEMS: A MEETING IN HONOuR Of THE 60TH BIRTHDAY OF ROBERT MACKAY FRS, 18-20 MAY 2016Report

Therewasanexpectantatmosphereasaround120 participants gathered onWednesday 18May 2016 in Lecture Theatre MS.01 of theZeemanBuildingattheUniversityofWarwickat the start of the LMS supported meetingon theDynamics of Complex Systems. Andrightlyso.Themeeting,heldinhonouroftheforthcoming60thbirthdayofProfessorRobertMacKayFRS,hadaline-upofspeakersdrawnfromthegreatsofpureandapplieddynamicalsystems, mathematical physics and complexsystemsscience,allareasinwhichRoberthasmadesignificantandlastingcontributions.The programme was grouped into themes,with sessions on Hamiltonian dynamics andK.A.M. theory, waves and turbulence, bio-logicalmodelling,dynamicsonlattices,socialdynamics, renormalization, billiard systems,topology and astronomy, as well as generaldynamical systems. Keynotes (amongst atotalof43 invited talks) included (in chrono-logical order) Jean-Pierre Eckmann (Geneva),TomBridges(Surrey),RaphaelDouady(StonyBrookandParisI),JimMeiss(Colorado),RafaeldelaLlave(GeorgiaTech),AlessandraCelletti(Rome–TorVergata),SergeAubry(CESaclay),Kostya Khanin (Toronto), Jacques Laskar

(Observatoire de Paris),Charles Tresser (Aperio),RobertMacKay (Warwick),Henk Broer (Groningen),Jaume Llibre (AutonomaBarcelona),SergeyBolotin(Wisconsin and Steklov),John Guaschi (Caen) andPhil Boyland (FloridaGainesville).Thereisinsufficientspacetodescribeindetailallthekeynotetalks,letalonealltheexcellentcontributionsbyotherparticipants,soIhopeIwillbeforgivenforfocusingonthreepresenta-tionsthatwereformeparticularlyspecial.ThefirstwasbyJacquesLaskarinwhichheshowedhow the approximateunidirectionality of ec-centricitiesintheorbitsofasteroidsinthefarsolarsystemprovidedstrongevidencefortheexistenceofanewplanetwhichmightreplacethe now demoted Pluto. The second wasby Robert himself, inwhich (using real-timeMathematica)herevealedhisideastowardsaspectralinterpretationoftheRiemannzeroes,correspondingtothequantumdynamicsofachargedparticleona surfaceof curvature -1withamagneticfield9/4.Mythirdfavourite

Participants

©AnnetteAnderson

Reports

RobertMackay


25

wasthefinaltalkofthemeeting,givenbyPhilBoylandwiththetitleWhen topology forces dynamics,duringwhichhedemonstratedbothmathematically (using the theory of pseudo-Anosovmaps) and experimentally (includingamachinedevisedbyRobert)howdynamicalcomplexityarisesfromtheunderlyingsystemtopology.The lively poster session (sponsored by theEuropean Physical Society) was of a particu-larlyhighstandard,andfirstandsecondprizewere deservedly won, respectively, by PhDstudents Jake Shipley (Sheffield)withBinary black hole shadows, chaotic scattering and the Cantor setandAineByrne(Nottingham)withNext generation neural mass modelling.Naturally, each participant will have theirownspecialmemoriesfromthemeeting,butsurely high on everyone’s list will be DavidRand’s after-dinner speech on the Thursdaynight, in which he charted (with his charac-teristic gentle humour) Robert’s career fromCambridge, via Princeton, IHES and QueenMaryUniversityofLondon,toWarwick(withasignificantreturntoCambridge)andRobert’s

keyworkbuildingup theNonlinear SystemsLaboratory and the Centre for Complex-ity ScienceatWarwick. David’s speechwasfollowedbyotheraffectionatetributesandaslideshowofRobert’scolleaguesandfriendsoverthepast35orsoyears.There are many people to thank for theirhardworkinorganisingthemeeting:ourhoststhe Warwick Mathematics Research Centre,especiallyHazelHiggens;oursponsorsEPSRC,EPS,IMA,LMSandProfessorJeffJohnson,thesession chairs, the speakers and other par-ticipants,andmyfelloworganisers.However,prideofplacemustgotoClaudeBaesens(whodidthelion’sshareofthework)and,ofcourse,RobertMacKaywhoseextraordinarycontribu-tion to mathematics and science was amplydemonstratedbythiswonderfulmeeting.

BenMestelTheOpenUniversity

Further information on the meeting isavailable from: https://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/maths/research/events/2015-16/nonsym-posium/dcs/

ReceptionforRobertMacKay

©TimHunt


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OPERATORS, OPERATOR FAMILIES AND ASYMPTOTICSReport

The research conferenceOperators, Operator Families and Asymptotics tookplace from16to 19May2016at theDepartmentofMath-ematical Sciences, University of Bath. Aswasreported in the February issue of the LMS Newsletter, the conference was aimed atprovidinganoverviewofapplicationsof thetechniques of operator theory to the asymp-totic analysis of parameter-dependent differ-entialequationsandboundary-valueproblems.From the physical point of view, theparameter in amathematical problemoftenrepresents a length-scale in the situationmodelled by the equation; for example, awavelength in wave propagation, or the in-homogeneity size in the theory of periodiccomposites. The theory of linear operators(symmetric, self-adjoint, dissipative, non-self-adjoint)inaHilbertspace,whichhasenjoyedseveraldecadesofoutstandingprogress,has

beenmostly restricted toabstractanalysisofgeneralclassesofoperators,accompaniedbyad-hoc examples and applications to pertur-bationsoftheLaplaceoperator.Themeetingwasastepinre-assessingtheexistingbodyofknowledgeintherelatedareas,asamodernoperator-theoretic version of the classical as-ymptoticanalysis.The conference was attended by over 40specialists in the areasof analysis and its ap-plicationswheretheasymptoticbehaviourofanoperatorfamilypresentsamathematicianwith an exciting analytical challenge and aphysicistwithanewtooltoaddressproblemsat the frontline of materials research. Onespecial feature of the conference was thateach of the 17 speakers, chosen by an inter-national programme committee, had a fullhour to present their work, which allowedtheaudiencetodelvedeeper intothetopics

Attendees

Reports


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YOuNG APPLIED ANALYSTS IN THE uKReport

The second Young Applied Analysts in the UK (YAAUK)conference took place from 26to 27 May 2016 at the Univer-sity of Bath. Applied analysis isstillunderrepresentedintheUKcompared to other subjects inapplied mathematics, and thefirst YAAUK conference, whichtook place two years ago atthe University of Glasgow, wasmotivated by the boost UKapplied analysis had recentlyreceivedfromhiringsinthebuilduptotheREF2014.This conference continuedthe format set out in the first;the speakerswere predominantly early careerresearchers (lecturers and postdocs) fromthroughout the UK. In addition to these 14speakers,Professor JoséAntonioCarrillode laPlata, "the oldest young applied analyst" (inhiswords), deliveredaplenary lectureon theDegenerateKeller-SegelModelintheDiffusion-DominatedRegime,whichwasaninspirationtotheyoungeranalysts.ThefirstYAAUKconferenceincludedapaneldiscussion to address the challenge of devel-oping home-grown talent in applied analysis.Thistimewetookdirectactionandshonethespotlighton sixpromisingvery youngappliedanalysts in a session of short talks by PhDstudents.

Themeeting was well attended with about30 participants from 15 institutions. The talkscovered a breadth of topics in PDEs and thecalculus of variations including geometricmeasuretheory,homogenization,liquidcrystals,material microstructure, nonlinear elasticity,nonlocal problems, optimal transport theory,regularity theory for elliptic PDEs, and statisti-cal mechanics.We are pleased to report thatappliedanalysisintheUKisaliveandflourishing.ThisconferencewassupportedbytheLondonMathematical Society, the Bath Institute forMathematical Innovation and the EdinburghMathematicalSociety.

LuciaScardiaUniversityofBath

Someoftheattendees

touched on by the talk. It was pleasing tosee that, as a consequence, all of the talksgenerated a series of questions,whichwerevigorously discussed by the audience. Italso meant that the 10 minutes allocatedfor questions following each talk servedas a basis for a more substantial discussionduringthecoffeeandlunchbreaksandintheevening.Participantsremarkedthattheyweremotivatedtopursuequestionsthatemerged

as a resultof thesediscussions,which inourview indicates that the conference was asuccess.The conference was supported by theLondonMathematicalSociety(Scheme1Con-ferencegrant),UniversityofBath,EPSRCandBath Institute for Mathematical Innovation(BIMI).

KirillCherednichenkoUniversityofBath


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NORTH BRITISH fuNCTIONAL ANALYSIS SEMINARReport

A meeting of the North British Function-al Analysis Seminar (NBFAS) was held atQueen’s University Belfast on Monday 30andTuesday31May2016.Thedistinguishedspeakers were Professor Eva Kopecká (Uni-versity of Innsbruck, Austria) Products of projections in Hilbert space, and ProfessorJanStochel (JagiellonianUniversityKrakow,Poland)Analytic composition operators on reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces of entire

functions.FurtherdetailsontheprogrammeincludingabstractsofthetalksareavailableontheNBFASwebsiteatwww1.maths.leeds.ac.uk/nbfas/belf16.html.NBFAS is partly supported by an LMSScheme3grantwhichisgratefullyacknowl-edged.

DrMartinMathieuQueen’sUniversityBelfast

NBFASSecretary

Professor Alexander Izzo from BowlingGreenStateUniversitywillbevisitingDrJoelFeinstein at the University of Nottinghamfrom14to20August2016.Professor Izzo studies Banach algebrasusing concrete and abstract methods fromcomplex analysis in one variable, severalcomplex variables, and functional analysis.During his visit he will continue his workwith Joel Feinstein on Banach and uniformalgebras.Inparticulartheywillbelookingat

a variety of problems concerning regularityconditions,peakpointsandantisymmetryforuniformalgebras.Professor Izzowill give a seminar entitled

Analytic structure in maximal ideal spacesattheUniversityofNottinghamonWednesday17Augustat4pm,RoomC27,PhysicsBuilding.For further details contact Joel Feinstein([email protected]) The visitof Professor Izzo is supported by an LMSScheme4ResearchinPairsgrant.

EvaKopecká JanStochel

VISIT Of ALEXANDER IZZO

Reports, Visits, Meetings


29

VISIT Of REZA LAMOuKI

ProfessorGholamRezaRokniLamouki(Universi-tyofTehran)isvisitingtheUKfrom21Juneto20July2016.Hisresearchinterestsareindynamicalsystems and control theory, especially partialstability with links to adaptive control theory,and mathematical biology. During his visit,ProfessorLamoukiwillbebasedprimarilyatthe

UniversityofExeter–PenrynCampus,hostedbyProfessor Stuart Townley ([email protected]).Hewillgiveaseminarthereon6July.HewillalsovisitandspeakattheUniversityofBathbetween18and21July:contactDrChrisGuiver([email protected]).For further details contact Stuart Townley([email protected]). The visit issupportedbyanLMSScheme5grant.

MATHEMATICS EDuCATION fOR THE NEXT DECADE The 13th international conference of theMathematics Education for the Future Project heldinCatania,SicilyinSeptember2015wasattendedby130peoplefrom22countries.The next conferencewill be held next yearatBalatonfüred,LakeBalaton,Hungaryfrom10 to 15 September 2017. The conference,Mathematics Education for the Next Decade,continues the search for innovation inmath-ematics, science, computing and statisticseducation. The thirteenprevious conferencessince 1999were renowned for their friendlyand productive atmosphere, and attractedmany movers and shakers from around theworld. There is now a call for papers andworkshop summaries for presentation at theconferenceandpublicationintheprintedcon-ference proceedings. For further details [email protected].

STOCHASTIC ANALYSIS AconferenceonStochastic Analysisinhonourof IstvánGyöngy’s65thBirthdaywillbeheldat the School of Mathematics, University ofEdinburghfrom10to12September2016.Sto-chasticAnalysisisanareaofmathematicsthathasbeengrowing in importance for the lasthalfcentury.Itisanactiveareaofresearchandthere have been important very recent theo-reticaladvances.The conference hosts many eminent re-searchers. The list of invited speakers andfurtherinformationisavailableatwww.ed.ac.

uk/maths/conference-on-stochastic-analysis-edinburgh-2016. The meeting will offer agoldenopportunityforparticipantstointeractwithworldleadersinthefield,generatenewideas and reinforce existing collaborations.Participantsshouldregisterattheconferencewebsite. There is some financial support forearlycareerresearchers.ThemeetingissupportedbyanLMSConfer-ence grant (www.lms.ac.uk/), EMS ResearchSupport Fund (www.ems.ac.uk), MIGSAA(www.maxwell.ac.uk/migsaa) and School ofMathematics, University of Edinburgh (www.maths.ed.ac.uk).

TOPICS IN SDES AND THEIR LINK TO (S)PDESAnafternoonworkshoponTopics in SDEs and their Link to (S)PDEs, celebrating a new ap-pointment,willbeheldattheSchoolofMath-ematics, University of Leeds on Monday 19September2016.Theaimof thisevent is topresentsomeofthecurrentresultsintheresearchareaoftheorganiser (Elena Issoglio), which is stochas-tic analysis. In particular discussing stochasticdifferential equations, forward-backwardstochastic differential equations, stochas-tic partial differential equations and theinterplay between these areas. We want tobringtogetherresearchersfromthenorthofEnglandwithaninterestinstochasticanalysis,particularly young researchers, to stimulatediscussions and possibly start new collabora-tions.Themainspeakersare:• FrancescoRusso(ENSTA-ParisTech)


30

• GoncaloDosReis(UniversityofEdinburgh)• ElenaIssoglio(UniversityofLeeds)Therewill also be three short talks by PhDstudentsandPost-DocsfromManchesterandYork.For further informationabout thismeetingvisit the website at www.maths.leeds.ac.uk/topics_in_sdes or email Elena Issoglio([email protected]). Anyone interested iswelcometoattend.ThismeetingissupportedbyanLMSConferencegrantCelebratingNewAppointments.

REPRESENTATIONS AND HOMOLOGY A one-day meeting on Representations and Homology will be held on Thursday 22September 2016 at the University of EastAnglia. Themeetingwill focus on represen-tation theory andhomological algebra. Thespeakersare:• JoeChuang(CityUniversity,London)• PeterJørgensen(NewcastleUniversity)• JosephGrant(UniversityofEastAnglia,Norwich)Emailj.grant@uea.ac.ukifyouwouldliketoattend.Therewillbeadinnerintheevening.Support is available for research students orearlycareerresearcherstoattend.Moreinfor-mationwillbeavailableathttp://josephgrant.eu/meeting2016.html.ThemeetingissupportedbyanLMSConfer-ence grant Celebrating New AppointmentsandbytheSchoolofMathematicsattheUni-versityofEastAnglia.

ALGEBRA, COMBINATORICS, DYNAMICS AND APPLICATIONSA workshop on Algebra, Combinatorics, Dynamics and Applicationswill takeplaceatQueen'sUniversityBelfastfrom29Augustto1September,2016. Itwill focusonrecentde-velopmentsandclassicalideasintheinterplaybetween structural properties of algebras,propertiesoftheirrepresentationsandcom-

binatorics and dynamics.More general struc-turesappearedinvariousapplications,inpar-ticularinphysics,analysis,geometry,topology,homotopy theory and coding theory willbe also considered. The topics will includequadratic, potential and monomial algebras,theirhomologicalpropertiesandKoszultypecomplexes, operadic generalisations, poissonandsymplecticstructures,Calabi-Yaualgebras,A-infinitystructures,nonassociativestructures,dynamicsandintegrability.TheorganisersareN.K.IyuduandS.A.Shkarin.Anyoneinterestediswelcometoattend.Somefundsmay be available to contribute to theexpenses of research students who wish toattend the meeting. Further details can befoundatthewebpageoftheworkshop:http://tinyurl.com/j546e6d.ThemeetingissupportedbyanLMSConferencegrant.

GEOMETRIC MODELS Of NuCLEAR MATTER The secondconferenceonGeometric Models of Nuclear Matterwill take place fromMon-day12toThursday15September2016attheUniversityofKent.Skyrmeproposedtomodelatomicnucleias solitons inanon-linearfieldtheoryofpions.Thismodelhasstimulatedin-novative and compelling research in a vari-ety of differentfields fromnuclear physics topuremathematics.This conferencewillbringtogetherresearchersthatworkonvariousas-pectsof the Skyrmemodel and relatedmod-els.Inaddition,wehaveinvitednuclearphysi-cistswhoworkonrelatedresearchquestions,furtherincreasingtheacademicimpactoftheconference.There isagrant to supporta smallnumberofPhDstudentstravellingfromtheUK.EmailSteffen Krusch ([email protected]) if youfall into this category andwish to apply for(partial)funding.Alistofspeakersandfurtherinformation is available at www.kent.ac.uk/smsas/personal/skyrmions/GMNMC2016.html.The conference is supported by an LMSConference grant, the IoPMathematical andTheoreticalPhysicsGroupandtheIoPNuclearPhysicsGroup.

Meetings


31

BRITISH SCIENCE fESTIVAL 2016TheFestival isorganizedby theBritish ScienceAssociation (a.k.a. theBritishAssociation fortheAdvancementofScience)andishostedthisyearbySwansea university from Tuesday 6 to friday 9 September(www.britishscienceassociation.org/british-science-festival).

Thefour-dayFestivalwillbefollowedbyaFamilyWeekend,10–11September.

Thesearesomeofthemathematicalsciencesrelatedeventsinthemainprogramme.

Presidential Lecture and Reception Post-modern cryptography: the unbreakable code?Cryptographyisthecornerstoneofouronlinesecurity,protectingouremailmessages,creditcardinformationandmedicalrecords.ThemathematicianandAdvisortoGCHQRichard Pinch will explore security andprivacy in an increasingly connectedworld anddescribehownewtechnologiessuchasquantumcomputingcouldthreatenourcyber-security.4 pm Wednesday 7 September

Adventures across the 7th Dimension

In7dimensionsthereexistspecialshapesthatmaygiveusthetoolstounlockthemysteriesoftheuniverse.Lookingfor this unique geometry is challenging but a possiblesolution takes inspiration from nature: specifically, soapbubbles and thermodynamics. In this talk Jason Lotay(UCL) will take a mathematical journey across multipledimensions,whilstexploringtheir role inart, scienceandpopularculture.2 pm, Tuesday 6 September

Can we predict the unpredictable?Howcanweattempttopredictearthquakes,financialcrashesandactsofterrorism?Sucheventscanoftenseemrandombutresearcherscanunpicktheunderlyingcomplexityusingprobabil-itymodelsknownasHawkesprocesses.Alan Hawkes (Swansea)himselfandhiscollaboratorMaggie Chen(Cardiff)willdiscussthewide-rangingapplicationsofthesemathematicalmodels.12 midday Wednesday 7 September

The calculus of contagionOneofthetoolsinthedisease-fighter’sarsenalismathematics.Howcanwemeasurediseasespread?Howcanafewkeypeopleshapeanoutbreak?Whichinfectionsarehardesttocontrol?Adam Kucharski(LondonSchoolofHygieneandTropicalMedicine)inthisAwardLecturewilldescribehisexperienceworkingtounderstandnewdiseasethreats,fromEbolatopandemicflu.12 midday Wednesday 7 September

Can Maths Solve the Sepsis Problem and Save Lives?Sepsiskills40,000peoplep.a.intheUK.Bloodpoisoningleadstopre-cipitouscollapseinheartfunctionleadingtomultipleorganfailureanddeathwithin days. Health experts suggest that earlier detection andtreatmentwouldsubstantiallyreducemortalityrates.Thetalk,byPhilip Aston (Surrey)andManasi Nandi (InstituteofPharmaceutical Science,KCL), will show howmathematical methods applied to physiologicaldatacanbeusedtoaddressanimportanthealthissue.12 midday Thursday 8 September


32

NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN DATA PRIVACY5 – 9 December 2016

inassociationwiththeIsaacNewtonInstituteprogrammeData Linkage and Anonymisation(4July–21December2016)

Thisclosingworkshopwillprovideaplatformforworkdevelopedovertheprogramme.Itwillbecomposedoftwomainparts:

i.Monday5thandTuesday6thDecemberwillbetargetedatanaudienceof'users'whodealwithpersonaldataandarelookingforwaystoshareitinpractice.Thesetwodays,coor-dinatedbyMarkElliot,aredesignedinparticularformembersoftheUKAnonymisationNetwork (ukanon.net).Mondaywill cover new approaches to anonymisation. Tuesdaywillexplorenewwaysinwhichdatasubjectscantakeanactivepartinhowtheirdataareshared.Presentationsonbothdayswillbedesignedtobeaccessibletoabroadaudienceandnotincludeverymathematical/technicalmaterial.

ii.Theremainingdaysoftheworkshopwillbedevotedtomoreestablishedresearch-lev-elpresentationswithin thebroad topicareaof theprogramme,witha focusonworkdevelopedovertheprogramme.Itisexpectedthataparticularfocuswillbeonapproach-es to assessingdisclosure risk andprivacy protectionbut other topics featuring in theprogrammemayalsobeincluded.Thesepresentationswilltypicallybeatahighermath-ematicallevel.

Furtherinformationavailablefromthewebsitewww.newton.ac.uk/event/dlaw03

Closing date for receipt of applications: 9 September 2016.

DYNAMIC NETWORKS12 – 16 December 2016

inassociationwiththeIsaacNewtonInstituteprogrammeTheoretical Foundations for Statistical Network Analysis

(11July–21December2016)

Networksrepresentrelational structure inasparseandcompactmanner.Verycommonlysuchrelationshipsevolveovertime,andthenumberofobjectsinthestudiedsystemmayalso increaseor decreaseover time.Understanding such complexphenomena is difficult,especially if theevolutionofthenetworkdependsonpreviouslyobservedstructure.Thisworkshopwillcovernewdynamicnetworkmodels,andunderstandingdevelopedregardingalreadyintroducedmodeltypes

Furtherinformationavailablefromthewebsitewww.newton.ac.uk/event/snaw04

Closing date for receipt of applications: 19 September 2016.


33

vv

Wiley and the London Mathematical Society are pleased to announce their forthcoming publishing partnership

As of January 2017, the Journal of the London Mathematical Society, Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, Transactions of the London Mathematical Society and Bulletin of the London Mathematical Society will be published by Wiley and hosted on Wiley Online Library, along with backfiles dating back to 1865. Articles from each of these prestigious journals will be available in both PDF and MathJax.

Continue submitting your papers to www.lms.ac.uk/publications/submit-paper

Bookmark this page for further information: www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/lms

New for 2017

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I. Mirkovic and S. Riche Linear Koszul duality. II: coherent sheaves on perfect sheaves 1–24

Susanna Zimmermann e Cremona group of the plane is compactly presented 25–46

Indranil Biswas, Oscar García-Prada and Jacques Hurtubise Pseudo-real principal G 46–74 evruc laer a revo seldnub-

A. Logunov, E. Malinnikova and P. Mozolyako On a theorem of Cartwright in 28–56 snoisnemid rehgih

Oliver Roche-Newton If (A + A)/(A + A) is small, then the ratio set is large 83–100

Sungwoon Kim and Joonhyung Kim Complex and quaternionic hyperbolic 221–101 sdle

Petter Andreas Bergh, Gustavo Jasso and aule Higher n-angulations 241–321 sgnir lacol morf

Menny Aka, Manfred Einsiedler and Uri Shapira Integer points on spheres and 851–341 sdirg lanogohtro rieht

Julien Keller About canonical Kähler metrics on Mumford semistable projective 471–951 evruc a revo seldnub

Régis de la Bretèche et Gérald Tenenbaum Sur l’inégalité de Turán–Kubilius friable 175–193

Vıtor Araújo, Alexander I. Bufetov and Simion Filip On Hölder-continuity 812–491 secapsbus stedelesO fo

Daniel Bergh 342–912 skcats gniyfissalc emos fo sessalc civitoM

Zarathustra Elessar Brady Sums of seven octahedral numbers 244–272

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Monica Musso, Juncheng Wei and Shusen Yan nitely many positive solutions 62–1 htworg lacitirc-repus htiw noitauqe dle

Mateusz Michałek, Bernd Sturmfels, Caroline Uhler and Piotr Zwiernik 65–72 seiteirav laitnenopxE

John D. Clemens, Clinton T. Conley and Benjamin D. Miller e smooth ideal 57–80

Lukas Lewark and Andrew Lobb New quantum obstructions to sliceness 81–114

Sal Barone and Saugata Basu On a real analog of Bezout inequality and the 541–511 snoitidnoc ngis fo stnenopmoc detcennoc fo rebmun

M. Bridgeman, R. Canary and A. Yarmola An improved bound for Sullivan’s 861–641 meroeht lluh xevnoc

Peter Albers, Kai Cieliebak and Urs Frauenfelder Symplectic Tate homology 169–205

P. Massey and M. Ravichandran Multivariable Schur–Horn theorems 206–234

VOLUME 112 PART 1 JANUARY 2017

ISSN 0024-6115 (Print)ISSN 1460-244X (Online)

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Bulletin of the London Mathematical Society


www.blms.oxfordjournals.org © London Mathematical Society 2016

PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS

Graeme Segal 11–1 secaps dna ecapS

ARTICLES

Pablo Spiga An application of the Local C(G, T eorem to a conjecture of Weiss 12–18Marco Golla and Paolo Lisca llings of contact torus bundles 19–37Marston D. E. Conder, Veronika Hucíková, Roman Nedela and Jozef Širáň

25–83 epyt cilobrepyh nevig fo spam larihCGreg Knese 75–35 secirtam 3 × 3 rof ytilauqeni nnamueN nov e Xavier Vidaux and Carlos R. Videla A note on the Northcott property and

26–85 ytilibadicednuCarlos Domingo-Salazar, Michael Lacey and Guillermo Rey Borderline

weak-type estimates for singular integrals and square functions 63–73Fernanda Botelho, Lajos Molnár and Gergő Nagy Linear bijections on

48–47 mrofsnart eghtulA-λ htiw gnitummoc srotcaf nnamueN novZhiqin Lu and Julie M. Rowlett One can hear the corners of a drum 85–93Evelia Rosa García Barroso and Arkadiusz Płoski e Milnor number

89–49 citsiretcarahc evitisop ni seitiralugnis elbicuderri enalp foPierre Le Boudec Height of rational points on quadratic twists of a given

801–99 evruc citpilleFrederick R. Cohen, David J. Hemmer and Daniel K. Nakano e Lie module

411–901 ytixelpmoc sti dnaGrigori Avramidi, Michael W. Davis, Boris Okun and Kevin Schreve e action

621–511 spuorg nitrA delgna-thgir fo noisnemidDhruv Mubayi and Vojtěch Rödl Hypergraph Ramsey numbers: tight cycles

431–721 seuqilc susrevDino Festi and Ronald van Luijk Unirationality of del Pezzo surfaces of

041–531 sdle L. Capuano, D. Masser, J. Pila and U. Zannier Rational points on Grassmannians

451–141 irot ni snoitcesretni ylekilnu dnaMateusz Wasilewski Amalgamated direct sums of operator spaces 155–162Hwajong Yoo Rational torsion points on Jacobians of Shimura curves 163–171

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Obituaries

MICHAEL MCCRuDDEN

DrMichaelMcCrudden,elected a member ofthe London Math-ematical Society on 18November 1965, diedon 29 October 2015,aged72.

Shrikrishna Dani, Charlotte McCrudden, Roger Plymen, Nigel

Ray and John Reade write:MickMcCruddenwas born and raised in Derry, NorthernIreland. He attended St Columbia's Collegeduring1954-60,andgraduatedfromQueen'sUniversityBelfastwithaBSc in1964andanMScin1965.HethenmovedtoEngland,andobtained his PhD from the University of Bir-mingham in 1969, under the supervision ofMurray Macbeath; his thesis addressed aprobleminmeasuretheoryonlocallycompactgroups.AfterayearintheUSAattheUniversityofWashington,Seattle,Mickwasappointedtoa

Lectureship inMathematicsat theUniversityof Manchester in 1971, where he remaineduntil his retirement in 2010. He had beenpromotedtoSeniorLecturer,andthenReaderin1993.For most of his mathematical careerMick was identified with the "embeddingproblem",which seeks tounderstand the re-lationship between two classes of measuresonalocallycompactgroup,namelythosethatareinfinitelydivisibleandthosethatarecon-tinuouslyembedded.Manyofhispublicationsduring1974-2007areonthis,orrelatedtopics.His 1981 Mathematische Zeitschrift papermadeabreakthrough,byestablishingaprevi-ouslyconjecturedembeddingtheoremforanyconnectedLiegroup,under theproviso thatthemeasurebelargeinacertainprecisesense.The review of the article in MathematicalReviewspronouncedthat"Thissettlesalong-standingproblemofprobabilitytheoryinLiegroups".HisworkgainedspecialrecognitionfromtheGermanschoolofHerbertHeyerandhis colleagues, and led to successful visits toTubingenandOberwolfach.In1985,achance

STATISTICAL MODELLING Of SCIENTIfIC EVIDENCE7 – 10 November 2016

inassociationwiththeIsaacNewtonInstituteprogrammeProbability and Statistics in Forensic Science

(18July–21December2016)

Thisworkshopwillbedevotedtheuseofcutting-edgestatisticalmethodsinallthetrace analysis situations that cause problems in court: physical evidence problemssuchasfibreorsoilanalysis,andDNAproblemssuchasmixedsamples,LCNsamples,degraded samples and rare Y-haplotypes. The investigations will be supported byanalysisofkeywell-knowncases suchas theAmandaKnoxtrial (lowtemplateandmixedDNAandrareY-haplotype).

Furtherinformationavailablefromthewebsitewww.newton.ac.uk/event/fosw03

Closing date for receipt of applications: 2 August 2016.


35

KARL BARTH

Professor Karl Barth,who was elected amemberoftheLondonMathematical Societyon 17 October 1975,died on 5 May 2016,aged77.

Phil Rippon writes (with assistance from Annette Lawson, Karl’s

partner of 18 years): Karl grew up in TexasCity,Texas,wherehewasValedictorianforhisclass at Texas City High School. He receivedhis Bachelor’s Degree, Master’s Degree andPhD in Mathematics from Rice University inHouston, and served as aU.S. Army Captainbefore joining the faculty at Syracuse Uni-versity,wherehewaspromoted to associateprofessor in 1970, to professor in 1977 and

retired in 2005. In 1975/6 and again in 1987hevisitedtheUKasaSeniorVisitingFellowoftheScienceandEngineeringResearchCounciltoworkwithDavidBrannan(QueenElizabethCollegeand thenTheOpenUniversity),withwhomhewroteseveralpapers,andhemademanysubsequentresearchvisitstotheUK.In his PhD thesis Karl worked on theboundarybehaviourofanalyticandmeromor-phicfunctionsthataredefinedintheunitdisc,buildingonearlierworkofhisPhDsupervisorGeraldMacLane,andother trailblazers suchas Fatou, Lindelöf, Iversen, Beurling, Colling-wood,Lohwater,Cartwright,Seidel,BagemihlandErdős.Hewrotenearlyfortypapersonthistopic, many published in LMS journals, AMSjournalsandCrelle’sJournal.During his early career Karl worked exten-sivelywithWalter J. Schneider (Syracuseandthen Carleton, Ottawa), mainly on the con-struction of extremely complicated counter-

encounter at Oberwolfach with S.G. Danilaunchedafruitfulcollaborationbetweenthetwo, lasting over twenty years; in particular,it included twopapers, in InventionesMath-ematicae (1992) andAdvances inMathemat-ics (2007), which resolved the embeddingproblem for a large class of Lie groups. Thecollaboration causedhim to visitMumbai in2002and2007,andstrengthenedhis reputa-tionamongst Indianprobabilists.Duringthisera he supervised PhD students Duncan Kel-ly-LythandSethWalker,andpublished jointworkwithbothofthem.Mick was a popular and effective teacherofstudentsofalllevelsandabilities,andwasknown for hiswillingness to bring an outra-geoussenseofhumourtobearatopportunemomentsinflaggingclassroomsituations.Hewas also a committed supporter of theManchesterMathematicstraditionofsocialis-ingwiththewiderUniversitycommunity,bothat lunchtimes and evenings. Until the early1970s these gatherings had focused on theCollegeHotel,closetotheMathematicsToweronOxfordRoad.Afterthedemolitionofthe

College, theymigrated to theGraftonArms,and later to the Salutation. Beyond closingtime, it was not unknown to return to theTower for furthermidnight drinks. In similarspirit he popularised annual Departmentaltrips to the Lake District, centred around aUniversity-ownedcottageinSatterthwaite.Apart from mathematics, Mick was acompetent guitarist and singer, who lovedto entertain all and sundry whenever theoccasion arose. He delighted in composingsongs of his own, on subjects ranging fromtemperamental office equipment to themenuofa localcurryhouse.Hewasalsoanenthusiastic5-a-sidefootballplayer,andwasan integral part of the ‘Maths Staff’ teamthat competedeach year inManchesterUni-versity'sseason-longCanadaCupcompetition,andregularlyemergedvictoriousfromgamesagainst startled students. His team-matesincluded LMS members Jeff Paris and NigelRay,whorecallthathewasparticularlyproudofhisexcellentleftfoot!Mick is survived by his children Charlotte,MeganandPatrick,andhisex-wifeSara.


36 THE G.H. HARDY READEREditedbyD.J.Albers,G.L.AlexandersonandW.Dunham,CambridgeUniversityPressandMAAPress,2016,pp410,34.99,US$49.99,ISBN978-1107594647.

G.H.HardywastheleadingBritishmathemati-cianofthefirsthalfonthetwentiethcentury,inspiringagenerationofnumbertheoristsandanalysts.Hewasalsothemostloyal,dedicatedand influentialmemberof theLondonMath-ematicalSociety.Hewaselectedasamemberin1901,andservedasSecretaryfrom1917to1926.HeistheonlymembertohaveservedtwotermsasPresident,servingfrom1926to1928,and fron1939 to1941,andhewasawardedtheDeMorganmedalin1929.AshesaidinhisPresidentialAddressof1928,`Myrecordofat-tendancein1917hasnoblemish.Ihavebeenat everymeetingbothof theCouncil andoftheSociety,andhavesatthrougheverywordofeverypaper'.Hardywas also themost generous benefac-toroftheSociety;helefthisestate(withalifeinteresttohissisterGertrude)andthecopyrightofhismanybookstotheSociety,andtheHardyLectureshipwascreatedinhishonour.On Hardy's death, the London Mathemati-calSocietyappointedacommitteetopreparethe publication of Hardy's collected papers

(includingthosewrittenjointlywithJ.E.Little-wood).Indoingso,theygroupedthepapersbysubject,dividingthemintosomedozengroups,andprovidedintroductionsandcommentsoneachofthesegroups,andonindividualpapers.Thiswasamassivetask,andthesevenvolumes,totallingover 5,000pages, appearedover 14years, from 1966 to 1979. In addition, therewas a full obituary notice by E.C. TitchmarshintheJournal,togetherwith`SomeAspectsofHardy'sMathematicalWork’which appearedin1950.What then did I expect to receive, whenasked to review the G.H. Hardy Reader,published under the imprint of CambridgeUniversityPress?First,thestoryofHardy'slife,so elegantly toldby Titchmarsh. Secondly, anaccountofhiswork,aswesee it today - theearliercommentsarenowsomefortytofiftyyearsold.Whatisthe`circlemethod',withitsmajorandminorarcs,andhowisitusedtoday?Are we still concerned with counting parti-tions? Where do Hardy's inequality and theHardy-Rieszinequalityfitintomodernanalysis?

Obituaries, Reviews

examplestoexistingconjectures,andlaterheworkedformanyyearswithPhilRippon(OpenUniversity), mainly on solutions and partialsolutions to problems and conjectures ofGeraldMacLane.Thislattercollaborationwassustainedin lateryearsbyKarl’sregulartripstoLondonwhereAnnettelives.HismanyvisitstotheOpenUniversityweremuchappreciatedashewasahighlysociablecolleagueaswellasagreatcollaboratorwithanencyclopaedicknowledgeof thehistoryofhis subject, andatleastonefurtherpaperfromthiscollabora-tioniscurrentlyunderdevelopment.Hisotherresearch collaborators included Jim Clunie,WalterHaymanandLindaSons.DuringhistimeatSyracuse,Karlalsoservedon a range of senior university committees.Outsidework,hewasanavidrunner,fisherman,

opera lover and reader. Earlier inhis life, heranmarathonsinNewYorkCity,LondonandWashingtonDC,andforthirtyyearsheenjoyedbeingamemberofalunchtimerunninggroup.LaterhelovedfishingwithhisdaughterCleaon Cayuga Lake, and attending operas atGlimmerglasswithmanygoodfriends,aswellas both opera and theatre in London’s richenvironmentwithAnnette.He also loved totravel,includingwonderfuljourneystoAfrica,Australia,NewZealandandItaly.Aboveallheloved the companyof friends,withdeliciousfood,wineandlaughter.Karl was predeceased by his second wifeLois Black, his daughter Justine Barth andhis brother Paul Barth. He is survived by hispartner Annette, daughter Clea Barth, fourstepsons,andthreestep-grandchildren.


37

THE G. H. HARDY READER

Donald J. Albers

Gerald L. Alexanderson

William Dunham

EDITORS

At a lower level, it would be good to readHardy's inaugural lectureasSavilianProfessorinOxford,and,forlightrelief,theattemptbyHardyandLittlewood,inanActaMathematicapaper,toexplaintheirargumentstocontinen-tal andAmericanmathematicians bymakingananalogywithcricket-`Theproblemismosteasily grasped when stated in the languageof cricket, or any other game in which anaverage is recorded.' `TheargumentsusedinSections5-6 are indeed mostly ofthetypewhichareintuitiveto a student of cricketaverages’.In fact, none of theseappear. The book ispublished inAmerica,prin-cipally by the Mathemati-cal Association of America,which caters for a mem-bership rather differentfromthatoftheAmericanMathematical Society orthe London MathematicalSociety. Its members can Isuppose be considered as`men(andwomentoo)likeJohnFarey'.JohnFareywasageologist inNapoleonic timeswhomadeafundamentalandimportantobservationaboutseriesoffractions(theFareyseries),thoughhegave no proof and did nothingmore.Manymembers of theMAAmay well knowmuchmoremathematics,butitisassumedthrough-outthatmathematicalknowledgedoesnorgomuchfurtherthanhighschoolmathematics.Theeditorspickoutfour`Hardygems',whichdo not serve Hardy's mathematics well. Forexample, an inequality is shown, withoutexplaining its use. The editors rather coylymentiontheCauchy-Schwarzinequality;infactHardygavetwoproofsof the inequality; thesecond, which uses Parseval's equation, andis relatedtoharmonicanalysis, ismuchmoreinteresting.Hardyisrenownedforsayingthatthemathematicsthathedidhadnopracticaluse. But thismust not bemisinterpreted.Hewrote`thebestmathematicsisseriousaswell

as beautiful - ìmportant' if you like', and À`serious'theoremisonewhichcontains`signifi-cant'ideas'.Ofthefour`Hardygems',onlyone(theHardy-Weinberglaw)meetsthesecriteria;theothersreflecttheold`MathematicalTripos'ideas,whichHardydidsomuchtoabolish.Thatapart,thereismuchtoenjoyhere.Thestory of Hardy's life is told (but without theelegance of Titchmarsh), and there is a fasci-

natingcollectionof storiesrelatingtohim.ItisperhapsapitythoughthatthereisnotmoreabouthistimeinAmerica, and his relationswith Europeanmathemati-cians. There are numerouspictures, of Hardy, and ofothers. There are threegoodexpositoryarticles,forthe American Associationfor the Advancement ofScience,andfortheBritishAssociation, althoughtheseareatanelementarylevel. There is much else,including Hardy’s `Whatis Geometry’ and `Caseagainst the MathematicalTripos’ (which the editors

seem to think `has long since disappeared’:not so– lastyear, thereweresome220thirdyear candidates, and 250 candidates for PartIII (about half coming to Cambridge havinggraduated elsewhere)). Not all of Hardy’sthoughts have weathered well -`Some NotesonCertainTheoremsinHigherTrigonometry’,concernedwithteachingtheexponentialandcircularfunctionstoschoolboys(somethinghedidnotdo!)isquitebizarre:surelywith`someelementary notions with regard to conver-gence’andthebinomialtheorem,onesimplyprovesthatez.ew=e(z+w),andallelsefollows.Hardy wrote about Euclid that `these areworks to take away on holiday, and read atbreakfastandlunchandteaandinbed'.Thismaybesaidaboutthepresentwork;butnottoreadìnone'sstudy'.

BenGarlingUniversityofCambridge


38

Reviews

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39

ence, etc). Since, inmost cases, thereare not many notesin the originalwork, sometimesit is not clear howthe drawings weremade, what was thesequence of stepsthatleadtothefinalconstructions. This isthemainchallengeofthebookand,awareofthesomehowspeculativenatureoftheirapproach,theauthors,atthebeginningofthe longest (and last) chapter, invite thereaders to find their own interpretationandnotjusttofollowwhatisproposed.Asmentionedintheintroduction,oneofthe most interesting, although not com-pletely surprising, conclusions that comeoutofthisbookisthatAlmadawasmuchmore concerned about the mathematicalrigorinhispreliminarystudiesthaninthefinal work of art. For the readers not sofamiliar with mathematics, the authorshaveincludedachapteraboutproportionsand trigonometry, with a special sectiondevoted to the golden ratio, a conceptthatinfluencedsomanyvisualworksinthehistoryofart and, inparticular,Almada'sconstructions. Not so obvious, but quitefascinating,aretherelevantrolesthattherelation9/10andtheBauhüttepointplayinseveralofhisgeometricstudies.Most of the figures of the book, aswell as very complete information aboutModernism in Portugal, can be found atthesite:www.modernismo.pt.

DanielPintoDepartmentofMathematicsFCTUC-UniversityofCoimbra

Editor’snote:ThisbookiswritteninPortuguesebutthe29colourillustrationswillappealtonon-Portuguesereaders.

Peopleusuallybecomefamousbecauseofsomethingtheydo,someparticularskillthatmakes them standout.AlmadaNegreiros(1893-1970) became famous because hewas very good at doing many differentthings. He was a painter, a writer, a cari-caturist and an occasional choreographer,scenographerandactor.Oftenmentionedas one of the most important Futuristartists in Portugal,AlmadaNegreiroswasalsooneofthecentralfiguresofOrpheu,aliterarymagazinelinkedtotheModernistmovement. Although it is possible tofind several geometric elements in his il-lustrationsandpaintings,itisinAlmada'smurals,forinstanceinthemuralComeçar in the Calouste Gulbenkin Museum inLisbon, that those elements are moreclearlypresent. SinceAlmadahas learnedgeometry by himself, one would expectthatmost of his constructions would notbe rigorousenough tobe studied fromamathematicalpointofview.However,theauthors of this book believed they couldfindinterestinggeometricrelationsbehindsomeofAlmada'spaintings,drawingsandsketches. Their method is the following:theytakeonedrawingandtheyuseobser-vationandmathematicstotrytofindtheprotocoloftheconstructionandAlmada'smaingoal(todividethecircumference,to

find the goldenangle, etc); then,withthehelpofGeoalgebra, adynamic math-ematicssoftware,they compareAlmada's resultwith the exactvalue (obtainedusing trigo-nometric laws,triangle similar-ity and congru-

LIVRO DE PROBLEMAS DE ALMADA NEGREIROS (Almada Negreiros - Book of Problems) by Simão Palmeirim Costa and Pedro J. Freitas,SociedadePortuguesadeMatemática,2015,pp128,€8.00,ISBN:978-9899950009.


40

QUITE RIGHT: THE STORY OF MATHEMATICS, MEASUREMENT & MONEY byNormanBiggs,OxfordUniversityPress,2016,pp192,£19.99,ISBN978-0198753353.

To write a short history of any academicdiscipline isadifficult jobtodowell.Theauthor needs to have a command of thesubjectwhichenableshimtogiveasenseofthebroadsweepofthedisciplineacrosstime.Healsoneedstobeabletojudicious-lychooseparticularplaces,peopleandde-velopments which will give the reader agoodsetof‘anchors’inthekeyaspectsofthesubject. InQuite RightNormanBiggs,emeritus professor ofmathematics at theLSE, has done both of these things won-derfully well, and produced an excellenthistoryofmathematics.Toachievesuchafeat inonly176pagesBiggs takes the social and financial usesof mathematics throughout history as aguidingtheme.Donotbemisledhowever;thisisnotahistoryoffinancialmathemat-ics. It is much broader than that. Rather,

theauthorusestheideasofmeasurementandmoney to helpmark a path throughmathematical history. This allows him toemphasise both the inherent usefulnessof the subject, and the fact that develop-ments in mathematics have often beendriven by practical problems. That suchproblems include the number of waysthe Hindu god Vishnumay hold the foursymbolsofhisattributes,thebeststrategytoadoptinthecardgameLe Her,andpub-lic-key cryptography, illustrates both thepower of mathematics, and the author’seye for awell-chosenexample.Of course,Biggsincludesmuchthatwewouldexpectinanyintroductoryhistoryofmathematics.Euclid,Archimedes,CardanoandTartaglia,the development of calculus and the riseof probability theory are all dealt with.Moreover, other topics (such as develop-

THE NEW MATHEMATICAL

SCIENCEbyDrMehranBasti

Differential Equations and PolynomialsVolumes1&2

Abstractavailableatinfinitypublishing.com

Additionalwork:DNA of Mathematics friesenpress.com

Reviews


41

ments in notation),which arementionedonly in passing, are dispatched with theaccuracy and concision of an authorwhoisincommandofhissubject.Finally,asetofendnotesprovidestheinterestedreaderwithgoodpointersforfurtherstudy.

Quite Rightmustbeoneof the shortesthistories of mathematics on the market,with,Ithink,onlythelateJackieStedall’sThe History of Mathematics: A Very Short Introductionhavingfewerpages.However,

this book’s brevity is one of its manystrengths.Alotofterritoryiscoveredverywellinarelativelyshortread.Thus,ifyouwant an brief introduction to the historyofmathematics, either for yourself, or touseaspartofafirstcourseonthesubjectfor students, then you would be QuiteRighttomakethisbookyourchoice.

MarkMcCartneySchoolofComputingandMathematics

UniversityofUlster

MATHEMATICAL MINDSETSbyJoBoaler,JohnWiley,2016,pp320,£13.00,€18.20,ISBN:978-0470894521.

It is reasonably problematic to reviewaccurately a book one has only partiallyread; indeed, this review has been in a“frozen” state for some weeks while Ihave tried to find the right approach. Itseems best to explain the problem, andleaveyoudecidewhetherthisisunfair.I should state that I am a secondaryschool Maths teacher. As such I ambothreasonablywell-informedaboutthe state of secondary school math-ematics, andalso concerned to learnhow to be a better teacher. Indeed,my main motivation for reviewingthis book was to seek pedagogicalimprovement.Iapproachedthisworkkeentolearn.The book starts well. I am com-pletelyinagreementwiththeauthorthat very many students are afraidof mathematics. This fear is, veryoften, a cause of significant under-achievement. I am completely inagreement that, as educators, weneed to recognise and address thisfear (which often perpetuates evenintoadulthood).And then, only on page 4, we findthefollowingquote.

A. (A) “...for the vast majority ofchildren – about 95% – any levels of

schoolmatharewithintheirreach”.

(myitalics).Thisisaremarkablestatement.It is saying, for example, that nearly allyears 7s would be capable, later in theirschoolcareer,offindingthefifthrootsofacomplexnumber.Thiscertainlydoesnothappenatthemoment.(ProfessorBoaler'sassessment of why this is not the case


42

Calendar

CALENDAR Of EVENTSThiscalendarlistsSocietymeetingsandother

mathematicalevents.Furtherinformation

maybeobtainedfromtheappropriateLMS

Newsletterwhosenumberisgiveninbrackets.

AfullerlistisgivenontheSociety’swebsite

(www.lms.ac.uk/content/calendar).Pleasesend

[email protected].

JuLY 20164-8PDESoftwareFrameworks2016,Warwick

4-8ModernTopicsinNonlinearPDEand

GeometricAnalysis,Reading(458)

4-8Modelling,AnalysisandSimulation:Crime

andImageProcessing,Oxford(457)

5-8DataLinkageandAnonymisationINI

Workshop,Cambridge(457)

6-8TheStone-CechCompactification,

Cambridge(458)

6-8QuantumRoundabout,Nottingham(459)

8LMSGraduateStudentMeeting,London(459)

8HardyLecture&LMSMeeting,London(459)

8MathematicalCommunicationduringtheCold

War,Oxford(459)

11-15GraphLimitsandStatisticINIWorkshop,

Cambridge(457)

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11-25AlgebraicCombinatoricsandGroup

Actions,HerstmonceuxCastle,EastSussex(456)

13-15RepresentationTheoryofAlgebraic

GroupsinhonourofStephenDonkin,York

(457)

15MathematicalFoundationsinBioinformatics,

KingsCollegeLondon

18-22RepresentationTheoryandPhysics

Workshop,Leeds(458)

18-227ECM,TUBerlin(456)

20MathematicalFoundationsinBioinformatics,

King’sCollegeLondon(458)

21LMSMeetingatthe7ECM,Berlin(460)

25-27BayesianMethodsforNetworksINI

Workshop,Cambridge(457)

25-31InternationalMathematicsCompetition

forUniversityStudents,Blagoevgrad,Bulgaria

(455)

seems to be because the teachers “havespent years deciding who can and whocan’t do maths and teaching them ac-cordingly”.)If you have less familiarity withsecondary education, try the followingversion of (A) (which ismy own),whichwouldseemtobenotionallyequivalent:

A. (B)“... for thevastmajorityofunder-graduates – about 95% – any levels ofuniversitymatharewithintheirreach”.

The saying that “extraordinary claimsrequire extraordinary evidence” issomethingofatruism,perhaps.However,there is no doubt that (A) genuinely isan extraordinary claim. However, thereis barely a trace of evidence presented.There is some discussion of researchinto the brains of blackcab drivers, andnotions of brain plasticity (which is notindoubt).Butthatseemstobeasfaras

it goes. We are told that “Einstein didnotreaduntilhewasnine”,whichisnotevenatruestory.Of course, there might be plenty ofresearch evidence available, just notpresentedinthebook.If(A)istruethenI, and just about every teacher on theplanet, have let their students down. If(A) is true then we need to completelyrethinkandreworkthewaywedomathseducation.My experience, based on many yearsas a teacher, is that (A) is simply nottrue. Very few students will be capableof finding the fifth roots of a complexnumber. That is not a value judgement,but it seems tobea fact. I ampreparedto be convinced otherwise, but it is notclear that there is anything in this booktodoso.

DaveSixsmithTheOpenUniversity


43

AuGuST 20161GalwayTopologyColloquium,Leicester(459)

1-4YoungResearchersinMathematics

Conference,StAndrews

2-5TopologyanditsApplications,Leicester

(459)

8-12GradedGeometryandApplicationsto

Physics,Sheffield(459)

25-26CaucasianMathematicsConference,

Turkey(453)

29-31BritishTopology,Glasgow(459)

29-1SepAlgebra,Combinatorics,Dynamicsand

Applications,Queen'sUniversityBelfast(460)

30-2SepTheNatureofQuestionsArisingin

CourtthatcanbeAddressedViaProbabilityand

StatisticalMethodsINIWorkshop,Cambridge

(458)

SEPTEMBER 20161-2InvariantSubspacesandBanachAlgebras,

Leeds(459)

5-8Hitchin70,Aarhus(458)

5-9CombinatoricsandOperatorsinQuantum

InformationTheoryLMSResearchSchool,

Belfast(458)

5-9KroneckerCoefficientsandtheir

ApplicationstoComplexityTheoryand

QuantumInformationTheory,CityUniversity

London(459)

6-7TranspennineTopologyTriangle,Manchester

(458)

6-9BritishScienceAssociation,Swansea(460)

7O-MinimalityandDiophantineGeometry,

Manchester(459)

10-12StochasticAnalysisinhonourofIstván

Gyöngy’s65thBirthday,Edinburgh(460)

9-11Hitchin70,Oxford(458)

12-15LMSMidlandsRegionalMeetingand

Workshop,Birmingham(460)

12-15GeometricModelsofNuclearMatter,

Kent(460)

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ApplicationsINIWorkshop,Cambridge(458)

NOVEMBER 20167-10StatisticalModellingofScientificEvidenceINIWorkshop,Cambridge(460)11LMSGraduateStudentMeeting,London11LMSAnnualGeneralMeeting,London

DECEMBER 20165-9NewDevelopmentsinDataPrivacyINIWorkshop,Cambridge(460)12-16DynamicNetworksINIWorkshop,Cambridge(460)20LMSSouthWest&SouthWalesRegionalMeeting,Bath

OCTOBER 201628Privacy:RecentDevelopmentsattheInterfacebetweenEconomicsandComputerScienceINIWorkshop,Cambridge(459)

13RandomMatrixTheory:Perspectivesand

Applications,Canterbury(459)

13-16LMSMidlandsRegionalMeetingand

Workshop,Birmingham(460)

15-16HeilbronnAnnualConference,Bristol

(459)

16-17MathematicalBiography,AMacTutor

Celebration,StAndrews(458)

18-23HeidelbergLaureateForum(454)

19TopicsinSDEsandtheirLinkto(S)PDEs,

Leeds(460)

21LMSPopularLectures,Birmingham(460)

22RepresentationsandHomology,Universityof

EastAnglia(460)

23CSACConference,Barcelona(460)

26-29BayesianNetworksandArgumentation

inEvidenceAnalysisINIWorkshop,Cambridge

(459)

26-30ClayResearchWorkshops,Oxford(459)

28ClayResearchConference,Oxford(459)

SEPTEMBER 201710-15MathematicsEducationfortheFuture

Decade,Balatonfüred,LakeBalaton,Hungary

(460)

THE BEAuTY Of MATHEMATICS AT THE CHELSEA fLOWER SHOW

(reportonpage16)

TheHarrodsBritishEccentricsgarden EndpointofFibonacciSpiral

Copperbowlwaterfeaturemirroringpatternsandsymmetriesofplants

WorldVisiongarden

MathematicalequationsontheFibonacciSpiral AdrianGraybalancingstones

Documents

LMS PRESIDENT-DESIGNATE · 2018-01-16 · hyperbolic geometry and symbolic dynamics. Revealing their deep links, it has had appli-cations to ergodic theory and Diophantine approximation,