Oxford Mathematicians Ruth Baker and Alex Scott have been awarded Leverhulme Research Fellowships. Ruth, a mathematical biologist, has been given her award to further her research in to efficient computational methods for testing biological hypotheses while Alex, who works in the areas of combinatorics, probability, and algorithms, will be working on interactions between local and global graph structure.
The Leverhume Research Fellowships are given to experienced researchers, particularly those who are or have been prevented by routine duties from completing a programme of original research.
From Bach’s Goldberg Variations to Schoenberg’s Twelve-tone rows, composers have exploited symmetry to create variations on a theme. But symmetry is also embedded in the very way instruments make sound. Marcus du Sautoy shares his passion for music, mathematics and their enduring and surprising relationship. The lecture culminates in a reconstruction of nineteenth-century scientist Ernst Chladni's exhibition that famously toured the courts of Europe to reveal extraordinary symmetrical shapes in the vibrations of a metal plate.
Marcus du Sautoy is Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University.
Oxford Mathematics's Professor Andrew Wiles has been awarded the Copley Medal, the Royal Society's oldest and most prestigious award. The medal is awarded annually for outstanding achievements in research in any branch of science and alternates between the physical and biological sciences.
Andrew Wiles is one of the world's foremost mathematicians. His proof of Fermat's Last Theorem in the 1990s catapulted him to unexpected fame as both the mathematical and the wider world were gripped by the solving of a 300 year-old mystery. In 1637 Fermat had stated that there are no whole number solutions to the equation $x^n + y^n = z^n$ when n is greater than 2, unless xyz=0. Fermat went on to claim that he had found a proof for the theorem, but said that the margin of the text he was making notes on was not wide enough to contain it.
After seven years of intense study in private at Princeton University, Andrew announced he had found a proof in 1993, combining three complex mathematical fields – modular forms, elliptic curves and Galois representations. However, he had not only solved the long-standing puzzle of the Theorem, but in doing so had created entirely new directions in mathematics, which have proved invaluable to other scientists in the years since his discovery.
Educated at Merton College, Oxford and Clare College, Cambridge, where he was supervised by John Coates, Andrew made brief visits to Bonn and Paris before in 1982 he became a professor at Princeton University, where he stayed for nearly 30 years. In 2011 he moved to Oxford as a Royal Society Research Professor. Andrew has won many prizes including, in 2016, the Abel Prize, the Nobel Prize of mathematics. He is an active member of the research community at Oxford, where he is a member of the eminent number theory research group. In his current research he is developing new ideas in the context of the Langlands Program, a set of far-reaching conjectures connecting number theory to algebraic geometry and the theory of automorphic forms.
Meteorologist Ed Lorenz was one of the founding fathers of chaos theory. In 1963 he showed with just three simple equations that the world around us could be both completely deterministic and yet practically unpredictable. In the 1990s, Lorenz’s work was popularised by science writer James Gleick who used the phrase “The Butterfly Effect” to describe Lorenz’s work. The notion that the flap of a butterfly’s wings could change the course of weather was an idea that Lorenz himself used. However, he used it to describe something much more radical - he didn’t know whether the Butterfly Effect was true or not.
In this lecture Tim Palmer discusses Ed Lorenz the man and his work, and compares and contrasts the meaning of the “Butterfly Effect" as most people understand it today, and as Lorenz himself intended it to mean.
Tim Palmer is Royal Society Research Professor in Climate Physics at the University of Oxford.
Juggling is the act of iteratively catching and throwing several objects. To a mathematician a juggling pattern can be described using a mathematical notation called siteswap. The idea of siteswap notation is to keep track of the order in which the objects are thrown. The notation does not indicate what kind of objects are being juggled (e.g. balls, rings, clubs, etc) or whether a special kind of throw is performed (e.g. under-the-leg or behind-the-back).
Mathematicians, young and old, win awards, lots of them and Oxford mathematicians have their fair share. However, any university department is of course also home to a range of support staff whose job it is, on a good day, to enable academics to make the best use of their time.
To recognise this role the Oxford University Students Union (OUSU) has its own awards for best support staff, and this year we are delighted to announce that Oxford Mathematics's own Sandy Patel scooped a prize. Sandy is Graduate Studies Administrator and her role is to ensure that our over 200 Graduate Students have the best possible experience during their time in Oxford and together with their Faculty supervisors are able to produce the best research in the subject. Graduate Students are the critical component of any research university and giving them the best support is vital.
Oxford Mathematician Philip Maini has been elected to the Academy of Medical Sciences for 2017. The Academy's mission is to advance biomedical and health research and its translation into benefits for society and this year's elected Fellows, 46 in total, have expertise that spans women’s health, immunology, public health and infectious disease among many other fields.
Philip Maini FRS, who is Professor of Mathematical Biology and Director of the Wolfson Centre for Mathematical Biology here in Oxford, is a leading figure in the field of mathematical biology with research interests spanning the modelling of avascular and vascular tumours, normal and abnormal wound healing, applications of mathematical modelling in pattern formation in early development, as well as the theoretical analysis of the mathematical models that arise in all these applications.
Oxford Mathematics's Ulrike Tillmann has been elected a member of the German National Academy of Sciences. The Academy, Leopoldina, brings together the expertise of some 1,500 distinguished scientists to bear on questions of social and political relevance, publishing unbiased and timely scientific opinions. The Leopoldina represents the German scientific community in international committees and pursues the advancement of science for the benefit of humankind and for a better future.
Historically it was known under the German name Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina until 2007, when it was declared a national academy of Germany. The Leopoldina is located in Halle. Founded in 1652, the Leopoldina claims to be the oldest continuously existing learned society in the world.
The Athena SWAN charter was establised in 2005 to encourage and recognise commitment to advancing the careers of women in science. In 2013 the Mathematical Institute here in Oxford was awarded a bronze medal and now, four years later, we are pleased to announce that we have been upgraded to silver.
Martin Bridson, Head of Department, said of the award: "Our Athena SWAN work supports the Department’s overarching aim of creating a working environment in which students and staff alike can achieve their full potential. This is a constant feature of all that we do, of course, but the process of self-reflection required in preparing our submission for this award provided a focus and stimulus to action that will benefit us all.
It is vital that the country’s leading departments be seen as beacons of commitment to supporting the work/life balance of their members and to redressing the under-representation of women in mathematics. This high-profile award does much to further our efforts in this direction."
Oxford Mathematician Jakub Konieczny has been awarded the Polish Mathematical Society Prize for Young Mathematicians for a series of works in combinatorics, additive number theory and ergodic theory. Jakub is a Postgraduate Student here in Oxford working under the supervision of Professor Ben Green.
