LONDONLONDON MATHEMATICALMATHEMATICAL SOCIETYSOCIETY

NEWSLETTER No. 429 October 2013

Society MeetingsSociety 2013 ELECTIONS voting the deadline for receipt of Meetings TO COUNCIL AND votes is 7 November 2013. and Events Members may like to note that and Events NOMINATING the LMS Election blog, moderated 2013 by the Scrutineers, can be found at: COMMITTEE http://discussions.lms.ac.uk/ Thursday 31 October The LMS 2013 elections will open on elections2013/. Good Practice Scheme 10th October 2013. LMS members Workshop, London will be contacted directly by the Future elections page 15 Electoral Reform Society (ERS), who Members are invited to make sug- Friday 15 November will send out the election material. gestions for nominees for future LMS Graduate Student In advance of this an email will be elections to Council. These should Meeting, London sent by the Society to all members be addressed to Dr Penny Davies 1 page 4 who are registered for electronic who is the Chair of the Nominat- communication informing them ing Committee (nominations@lms. Friday 15 November that they can expect to shortly re- ac.uk). Members may also make LMS AGM, London ceive some election correspondence direct nominations: details will be page 5 from the ERS. published in the April 2014 News- Monday 16 December Those not registered to receive letter or are available from Duncan SW & South Wales email correspondence will receive Turton at the LMS (duncan.turton@ Regional Meeting, all communications in paper for- lms.ac.uk). Swansea mat, both from the Society and 18-21 December from the ERS. Members should ANNUAL GENERAL LMS Prospects in check their post/email regularly in MEETING Mathematics, Durham October for communications re- page 11 garding the elections. The Annual General Meeting of With respect to the election it- the Society will be held at 3.00 pm 2014 self, there are seven candidates on Friday 15 November 2013 in proposed for five vacancies for the Jeffrey Hall at the Institute of Friday 28 February Member-at-Large. One candidate Education, 20 Bedford Way, London Mary Cartwright has been nominated for the new WC1H 0AL. The business shall be: Lecture, York role of Member-at-Large (Librar- 1. Elections to Council and Monday 31 March ian). Four candidates have been Nominating Committee Northern Regional proposed for two vacancies in the 2. Report of the President Meeting, Durham membership of Nominating Com- 3. Report of the Treasurer: mittee. The slates and candidate a. adoption of the Trustees biographies for the election can Report for 2012/13 NEWSLETTER be found on the LMS website at b. appointment of Auditors ONLINE:NEWSLETTER www.lms.ac.uk/about/council/ 4. Presentation of De Morgan med- newsletter.lms.ac.ukONLINE: lms-election-2013. al and certificates to LMS Prize newsletter.lms.ac.uk For both electronic and postal winners LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

It is hoped that as many members as pos- ANNUAL LMS (STEM) education. The letter is available at Full tables of results are available on the sible will be able to attend. The Annual Gen- http://tinyurl.com/p3kxbuv. Joint Council for Qualifications website at eral Meeting will be followed by a Society SUBSCRIPTION 2013-14 www.jcq.org.uk/examination-results/a-levels. meeting, with the Presidential address, given Members are reminded that their annual Destinations of leavers from higher educa- by Graeme Segal and a lecture by Simon Don- subscription, including payment for publica- tion institutions GCSE results aldson (see page 5). tions, for the period November 2013-October The Higher Education Statistics Agency The number of GCSE mathematics entries 2014 is due on 1 November 2013 and should (HESA) has published a report presenting has risen by 12.5% compared with last year’s Fiona Nixon be paid no later than 1 December 2013. findings from the Destinations of Leavers entries. 760,170 students sat the exam in Executive Secretary In September, the Society sent a remind- from Higher Education (DLHE) Longitudinal 2013 compared with 675,789 in 2012. In oth- er to all members to renew their subscrip- Survey conducted during winter 2012/13, a er STEM subjects, entries for Biology, Chem- LMS Newsletter tion for 2013-14. If you have not received bi-annual survey that was first conducted istry and Physics rose by 5%, 4.4% and 2.1% http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk a reminder, please email membership@lms. for the cohort of leavers from 2002/03. The respectively. ac.uk. survey was carried out among the cohort of Full tables of results are available on the Editorial office: London Mathematical Society, Further information about subscription students who completed a higher education Joint Council for Qualifications website at De Morgan House, 57–58 Russell Square, Lon- rates for 2013-14 and a subscription form may course at a higher education institution in www.jcq.org.uk/examination-results/gcses. don WC1B 4HS (t: 020 7637 3686; f: 020 7323 also be found on the Society’s website: www. the UK in 2008/09. The aim of the survey was 3655) lms.ac.uk/content/paying-your-subscription to collect information on the activities of UK Consultation responses Articles: send articles to [email protected] Please note all members are asked to com- and EU domiciled leavers who completed a The LMS has responded to the Department Events calendar: updates and corrections to plete and return the subscription form as it higher education course in 2008/09, approxi- for Education consultations on GCSE subject [email protected] also requests permission to include members’ mately 3.5 years after leaving higher edu- content and assessment objectives. The LMS Advertising: for rates and guidelines see www.lms.ac.uk/newsletter/ratecard.html details in the Members’ Handbook 2014. cation. The report provides subject specific response is now available on the LMS website 2 General Editor: Mr A.J.S. Mann The Society encourages payment by direct information. More information is available at http://tinyurl.com/pzqfg4g. All responses 3 ([email protected]) debit. If you do not already pay by this meth- at www.hesa.ac.uk/content/view/2939/. can be viewed at the National curriculum re- Reports Editor: Professor R.A. Wilson od and would like to set up a direct debit view: new programmes of study and attain- ([email protected]) (this requires a UK bank account), please Higher education in facts and figures ment targets from September 2014, which is Reviews Editor: Professor D. Singerman visit the LMS website to download the direct Universities UK has produced its annual sta- available at http://tinyurl.com/olp2f8p. ([email protected]) debit mandate form: www.lms.ac.uk/sites/de tistics publication presenting statistics relat- The Society has also responded to the Of- Administrative Editor: S.M. Oakes fault/files/Membership/Direct%20Debit%20 ing to students, staff and finance for the qual consultation on GCSE reform. The re- ([email protected]) Form.pdf. whole of the UK higher education sector. sponse is available on the LMS website at lms. Typeset by the LMS at De Morgan House; The Society also accepts payment by The publication is available at http://tinyurl. ac.uk/policy/reports-and-policy-submissions. printed by Holbrooks Printers Ltd. cheque or credit/debit card. com/pwyq9fc. More data tables, with subject Publication dates and deadlines: published specific data, are available at http://tinyurl. Improving post-16 mathematics skills monthly, except August. Items and advertise- Elizabeth Fisher com/nn6shtq. The Secretary of State for Education, Michael ments by the first day of the month prior to Membership & Activities Officer SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES Gove, has written to a number of bodies and publication, or the closest preceding working royal societies about improving mathemat- day. Notices and advertisements are not ac- MATHEMATICS Popularity of mathematics continues to ics skills for 16 to 18-year-olds. The letter is cepted for events that occur in the first week of grow available at http://tinyurl.com/o64wxxm. the publication month. POLICY ROUND-UP The number of A-level mathematics entries News items and notices in the Newsletter may OTHER be freely used elsewhere unless otherwise September 2013 across the UK is up 2.7% on last year, with 88,060 students sitting the exam. Figures re- Women in STEM consultation stated, although attribution is requested when HIGHER EDUCATION reproducing whole articles. Contributions to leased by the Joint Council for Qualifications The LMS (through CMS) has responded the Newsletter are made under a non-exclusive STEM education also show that: to the House of Commons Science and licence; please contact the author or photog- The Council for Science and Technology • A-level further mathematics has contin- Technology Select Committee inquiry on rapher for the rights to reproduce. The LMS (the Prime Minister's top level, independ- ued to increase in popularity, with entries Women in STEM Careers. The response is cannot accept responsibility for the accuracy of ent advisory board on science and technol- rising by 4.5% (to 13,821) available on the LMS website at lms.ac.uk/ information in the Newsletter. Views expressed ogy policy issues) has written a public letter • AS mathematics entries rose by 1.5% (to policy/reports-and-policy-submissions. do not necessarily represent the views or policy to education secretary Michael Gove making 150,787) of the London Mathematical Society. recommendations on topics within science, • AS further mathematics entries rose by Dr John Johnston Charity registration number: 252660. technology, engineering, and mathematics 7.9% (to 22,601) Joint Promotion of Mathematics LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

LONDON MATHEMATICAL SOCIETY LONDON MATHEMATICAL SOCIETY GRADUATE STUDENT MEETING Annual General Meeting Friday 15 November 2013 Russell Room, CIPR, 52-53 Russell Square, London WC1B 4HP Friday 15 November 2013 (Nearest tube: Russell Square) 3.00 – 6.00 pm This meeting is intended as an introduction to the Society Meeting later in the day. All graduate students (and indeed any other mathematicians) will be very welcome. Jeffrey Hall, Institute of Education 20 Bedford Way, London, WC1H 0AL. (Nearest tube: Russell Square) Preliminary Programme 09.30 Coffee and Registration 10.00 1st Speaker TBC Programme 11.00 Coffee/Tea 11.15 Graduate student talks Annual General Meeting 12.45 Lunch 13.40 Award prizes Simon Donaldson (Imperial College) 13.45 2nd Speaker TBC 4 5 14.45 Close of Meeting Tea/Coffee 15.00 LMS Annual General Meeting and Society Meeting Announcement of Election Results Registration To register, please email Elizabeth Fisher ([email protected]) by email by Graeme Segal (Oxford) 8 November. Places are free and all refreshments including lunch will be provided. Presidential Address

Student Talks Students are invited to give short talks (15 minutes) aimed at a general mathematical The meeting will include the presentation of certificates to the LMS audience. Prizes will be awarded for the best two talks. If you would like to give a talk, prize winners in 2013. please email Richard Thomas ([email protected]).

Travel The meeting will be followed by a reception at De Morgan House, Russell The lectures will be held in the Russell Room, CIPR, 52-53 Russell Square, London WC1B Square, and the Society’s Annual Dinner at the Montague Hotel, 15 Mon- 4HP. For directions see: www.cipr.co.uk/content/venue-and-room-hire/location. tague Street, London WC1B 5BJ. The cost to attend the dinner will be £53 Travel grants of up to £50 are available for students who attend both the Graduate per person. Student Meeting and the Annual General Meeting. Those wishing to attend the dinner should contact Leanne Marshall LMS Annual General Meeting and Society Meeting The LMS Annual General Meeting is a Society Meeting, which is open to all. Simon Don- ([email protected]) by Monday 4 November. aldson (Imperial College London) will give the first lecture and Graeme Segal (Oxford) will give the Presidential Address. The meeting will be held in the Jeffrey Hall at the For further details about the AGM, please contact Elizabeth Fisher Institute of Education, 20 Bedford Way, London WC1BH. ([email protected]). After the AGM, there will be a reception at De Morgan House, 57-58 Russell Square. For further details see: www.lms.ac.uk/content/society-meetings. LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

SOCIETY CONFERANCE GRANTS Wales Mathematics Colloquium 2013 20-22 May 2013, A. R. Davies £1,560 Wales During the financial year 2012/13 the soci- for participants from Scheme 5 or former UCL Geometry Day 30 May 2013, F. Schulze £600 ety awarded 64 grants, totalling £217,700, Soviet Union countries. For Postgraduate UCL in the support of mathematical confer- Research Conferences funds are granted ences. Funds are granted to the organisers to support participants. Applicants wish- Riemann-Hilbert Problems and their Applications 29-30 May 2013, J. Virtanen £600 of conferences to be held in the United ing to apply for funding for a conference Reading Kingdom, and may be used to cover the will find further details on the Soci- One-day Meeting in Combinatorics 5 Jun 2013, A. Scott £2,000 expenses of principal speakers, and to ety’s website at www.lms.ac.uk/content/ Oxford provide support for research students and research-grants.

Conference grants awarded during 2012-13 Open Quantum System Identification 10 Jun 2013, D.K. £571 Aberystwyth Burgarth Conference Dates, Place Applicant Grant Stochastic Differential Delay Equa- 10-11 Jun 2013, X. Mao £7,000 tions and Their Applications Strathclyde Legacy of Goodstein 14 Dec 2012, R.M. £3,000 Leicester Thomas Uncertainty in Interaction Networks 12-14 Jun 2013, T. Rogers £3,333 Winter Combinatorics Meeting 30 Jan 2013, R. Brignall £520 Bath Open University Conformal Geometry and Function Theory 20-21 June 2013, D. Crowdy £6,000 Hyperbolic Equations: Solvabil- 13 Feb 2013, C. Garetto £500 in Mapping, Imaging and Sensing Imperial Col- ity and Asymptotic Properties Loughborough lege London 6 13 Mar 2013, J. Gauntlett UK National Conference on Geophysical, Astro- 20-21 Jun 2013, R. Simitev £2,950 7 A Meeting to Celebrate the 80th Imperial £4,000 physical and Industrial Magnetohydrodynamics Glasgow Birthday of Tom Kibble College London Differential Geometry and Continuum Mechanics 17-21 Jun 2013, M. Grinfeld £1,600 UCL Geometry and Topology Days 20 Feb and J. Lotay £600 ICMS 20 Mar Relativistic Quantum Information (North) 24-26 Jun 2013, J. Doukas 4,000 2013, UCL £ Nottingham Finite Simple Groups, Algebra- 10 April 2013, B. Fairbairn £555 Continuity, Computability, Constructivity 26 Jun - 1 M. Seisen- 5,330 ic Groups and their Impact Birkbeck £ Jul 2013, berger BAMC 2013 9-12 Apr 2013, D.W. £5,000 Gregynog Leeds Hughes Spectral Analysis and Differential Equations 1-2 Jul 2013, I. Wood £5,410 Integrable Models, Conformal Field 12-13 Apr 2013, C. Young £1,580 Cardiff Theory and Related Topics Hertfordshire 24th British Combinatorial Conference 30 Jun - 5 S. Gerke £6,000 Geometric and Topological Graph Theory 15-19 Apr 2013, A. Nixon £1,000 Jul 2013, Bristol RHUL Combinatorics, Algebra, and More: 8-10 Jul 2013, L.H. Soicher £3,095 Inaugural Meeting in Algebraic Geometry Apr 2013, D. Testa £600 A Conference in Celebration of Peter Cameron QMUL Warwick Conference on Intelligent Computer 8-12 Jul 2013, J.H. £5,870 Mathematical Models of Biological Evolution: 1-3 May 2013, A. Morozov £3,300 Mathematics Bath Davenport Recent Progress, Current Challenges Leicester and Future Directions Groups St Andrews 2013 3-11 Aug 2013, M. Quick £7,000 String Math UK (SMUK) 10-11 May 2013, M. Wolf £3,430 St Andrews Surrey Mathematical Modelling of Ecology 12-15 Aug 2013, J. Pitchford £6,870 and Evolution York Two linked one-day colloquia in Combinatorics 15-16 May 2013, J. Skokan £3,000 QMUL and LSE Fundamentals of Computation Theory 19-21 Aug 2013, I. Potapov £2,660 Liverpool LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

One-day Function Theory Meeting 2 Sep 2013, D. Nicks £1,746 Noncommutative Geometry 29 Nov 2013, C. Voigt £600 De Morgan Glasgow House Workshop on Combinatorial Physics 17-19 Dec 2013, R. Behrend £1,920 Cardiff Advanced Decomposition Methods 2-4 Sep 2013, C-H. Lai £4,000 for Partial Differential Equations Kingston Interfaces Between Numerical Analysis 15 Jan 2014, K. £600 Fibre-reinforced Materials: Theory and 2-5 Sep 2013, K.P. £7,000 and Computational Statistics Southampton Zygalakis Applications Euromech Colloquium 551 Nottingham Soldatos International Workshop on Operator Theory 3-5 Sep 2014 M. Mathieu £6,010 Queen's Uni- Algebra, Combinatorics, Dynamics 2-5 Sep 2013, N. Iyudu, £5,200 versity Belfast and Applications QUB S. Shkarin British Logic Colloquium 2013, 4-7 Sep 2013, H.D. £4,055 Joint meeting of the BMC and BAMC 30 Mar - R. Camina £15,000 with Dummett Day Leeds Macpher- 2 Apr 2015 son Cambridge Recent Trend in Classical and Complex Fluids 5-7 Sep 2013, M. Dashti £2,000 Sussex Postgraduate Research Conference grants awarded during 2012-13 British Topology Meeting 6-11 Sep 2013, R. £5,000 Aberdeen Hepworth Conference Dates, Place Applicant/Organiser Grant Young Functional 20 - 22 March 2013, Applicant: P. Mitchener £3,938 Spectral Geometry, Chaos and Dynamics 9-13 Sep 2013, B. Winn £5,404 Analysts' Workshop Sheffield Organisers: V. Quigley 8 Loughborough 9 Char p Methods in 2 - 5 April 2013, Applicant: P. Cascini £4,000 From Spectral Gaps to Particle Filters 17-18 Sep 2013, R. Everitt £2,400 Algebraic Geometry Imperial College London Organisers: A. Fanelli, Reading J. Martinez-Garcia Quantum Fields, 3 - 5 April 2013, Applicant: D. Riley £4,000 Mathematical Challenges in Bubbles 19 Sep 2013, P. Flavell £5,440 Gravity and Nottingham Organisers: A.R. Lee, and Biological Fluid Mechanics Birmingham Information S. Tavares, N. Friis Classifying Structures for Operator Algebras 16-20 Sep 2013, D. G. Evans £5,100 and Dynamical Systems Aberystwyth Young Topology 25-26 April 2013, Applicant: J. Gibbons £2,565 Meeting UK Imperial College London Organiser: S. Barthel Stochastic Analysis and Applications 23-27 Sept 2013, D. Crisan £7,000 Young Researchers in 17 - 20 June 2013, Applicant: K. Brown £5,800 Oxford Mathematics 2013 Edinburgh Organiser: A. Rovi Aspects of PDEs 27 Sept 2013, A. £600 Warwick Malchiodi 15th Postgradu- 2-4 July 2013, Applicant: P. Rowley £4,000 ate Group Theory Manchester Organiser: P. Bradley Integrable Systems in Newcastle 4-5 Oct 2013, S. £1,550 Conference Northumbria Lombardo 2013 Postgradu- 14-16 August 2013, Applicant: I. Moffatt £4,000 ate Combinato- RHUL Organiser: A. MCDowell Derived Categories and Algebraic Geometry 17 Oct 2013, T. £560 rial Conference Cardiff Logvinenko Novembertagung 20-22 November 2013, Applicant: I. Short, £2,947 C*-algebras in Scotland 26 Oct 2013, A. Tikuisis £600 on the History of De Morgan House, Organisers: R. Cret- Aberdeen Mathematics London ney, M. Walker Network Coding, Partitions and Security 6 Nov 2013, M. £542 Durham Gadouleau British Postgradu- 13-15 January 2014, Applicant: J. Truss £4,000 ate Model Theory University of Leeds Organisers: D. Wood, Graphs, Groups & Probability 15 Nov 2013, A. Georga- £600 Warwick kopoulos Conference R. Barham LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

William Benter Prize in Applied Mathematics 2014 Call for NOMINATIONS

The Liu Bie Ju Centre for Mathematical Sciences of City University of Hong Kong is inviting nominations of candidates for the William Benter Prize in Applied Mathematics, an international award. The Prize

The Prize recognizes outstanding mathematical contributions that have had a direct and fundamental impact on scientific, business, financial, and engineering applications. It will be awarded to a single person for a single contribution or for a body of related contributions of his/her research or for his/her lifetime achievement. The Prize is presented every two years and the amount of the award is US$100,000.

Nominations

Nomination is open to everyone. Nominations should not be disclosed to the nominees and self-nominations will not be accepted. 10 A nomination should include a covering letter with justifications, the CV of the nominee, and two 11 supporting letters. Nominations should be submitted to: Selection Committee c/o Liu Bie Ju Centre for Mathematical Sciences City University of Hong Kong Tat Chee Avenue Kowloon Hong Kong Or by email to: [email protected] Deadline for nominations: 31 December 2013 Presentation of Prize

The recipient of the Prize will be announced at the International Conference on Applied Mathematics 2014 from 1 to 5 December 2014. The Prize Laureate is expected to attend the award ceremony and to present a lecture at the conference.

The Prize was set up in 2008 in honor of Mr William Benter for his dedication and generous support to the enhancement of the University’s strength in mathematics. The inaugural winner in 2010 was George C Papanicolaou (Robert Grimmett Professor of Mathematics at Stanford University), and the 2012 Prize went to James D Murray (Senior Scholar, Princeton University; Professor Emeritus of Mathematical Biology, University of Oxford; and Professor Emeritus of Applied Mathematics, University of Washington). The Liu Bie Ju Centre for Mathematical Sciences was established in 1995 with the aim of supporting world-class research in applied mathematics and in computational mathematics. As a leading research centre in the Asia-Pacific region, its basic objective is to strive for excellence in applied mathematical sciences. For more information about the Prize and the Centre, please visit http://www.cityu.edu.hk/lbj/ LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

Meeting of the LMS Editorial Advisory Board 2013 difficult to read. If you want the panel to consider a colour version of your application, The Editorial Advisory Board of the London course problems with referees date back to then you have to send the relevant number Mathematical Society met at De Morgan the dawn of time, but there are a slew of Being a member of the assessment panel of copies of it to the Equality Challenge Unit. House on 6th of September, with the vast newer issues associated with the Internet The panel is also sent an electronic version of majority of the members of the board be- Age. The web-based system the journals The London Mathematical Society strongly sup- the applications which a member might print ing present, as well as all seven editors of have in place has much to commend it, but ports advancing women's careers in university in black and white regardless. the various journals. Susan Hezlet and other it's being noted by some that this is making mathematics departments. The LMS Women in • The panels felt that ideally the Head of De- members of the publications team also took paper flow harder to predict. There was Mathematics Committee has developed a Good partment letter should talk about a strategic part, with the Publications Secretary, John discussion of a usage analysis which showed Practice Scheme with the aim of supporting vision, but essentially none of them did! Jones, acting as chair. Neil Scriven of OUP a remarkable increase in the proportion of mathematics departments interested in embed- • Don't make the diagrams, tables and data gave a presentation after lunch. papers with arXiv versions, as well as some ding equal opportunities for women within their analysis highly technical and complicated. The meeting brought together a collec- detailed cluster & competitor analysis pre- working practices. The Scheme provides specific Not all members of the panel are necessarily tion of both wise old heads and young neo- sented by Susan Hezlet. An account was support for departments working towards Athe- numerate! phyte advisers. Despite, or perhaps because given by Neil Scriven of OUP of the work na SWAN Award status. Athena SWAN Awards • The panels really wanted an honest assess- of, the splendid Turkish meal in which the he does on the journals, and this resulted in recognise success in developing employment ment of where the department is and were board had indulged on the previous night, some suggestions of mechanisms by which practices to further and support the careers of not happy if they thought applications were the discussion was a rather wide ranging outstanding papers could be selected for women in science, technology, engineering, trying to hide something or were just too one, touching upon matters of current in- marketing purposes. mathematics and medicine (STEMM) depart- complacent.} terest and concern for the publishing side of The meeting concluded with the resolu- ments in higher education. • For Silver awards, the panels looked for activi- the LMS's activities. tion that the Board should meet again two I have been a member of two Athena SWAN ties that had been happening for a period of 12 The editors presented reports on their years from now, or maybe three. assessment panels in March and June of this year. time (years), with measurable effect. 13 various journals and on the whole the news Both panels had an odd number of members, seemed good. Many practical issues were Darren Long consisted of academics and administrators (usu- Self-assessment addressed over the course of the day: Of University of California, Santa Barbara ally from Human Resources), had both female • Analyse your data honestly. The panels liked and male members and guidance from two (and commended), applications that were members of Athena SWAN. When considering very honest in their assessment of the current applications from departments, one of the panel situation. If in your self-assessment of the was a subject specialist, i.e. when considering department there is a major issue then say so an application from a Mathematics department and use the Action Plan to show how you're one of the panel is a Mathematician. Here I out- going to address the issue. line what the panels I have experienced like and • Be consistent when comparing your data to dislike. that of other departments in your discipline. Either compare your data to the national General comments average, or compare with a set of comparator • Ensure that the self-assessment committee universities (with reasons). For example, mem- is balanced, has female and male members bers of the Russell Group (or the 1994 Group) and includes a member of the department's might compare themselves to other members management team. The panels felt it was very of the Group, to the Group average, or to the important that the senior management team national average. of the department were seen to be fully en- • The data does need to be complete and well gaged with the process (and be represented presented -- and then (very importantly) there on the team). It is important that if the com- needs to be honest reflection on what the mittee recommends changes in departmental data is saying, what the key issues are and procedures that there is someone with the what actions are proposed to try and address seniority to see that this happens. the issues. The panels really liked an applica- • The panel is sent copies of the applications tion that referred to the action plan in the in {black and white}, so {colour} diagrams are main text. LMS Advisers, the publications secretary and publications staff in the De Morgan House gardens not as effective and in some cases were quite • If there are different groups within the de- LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

partment of different natures then the data for a period after returning from maternity GOOD PRACTICE Chemistry at the University of York – the first should be separated out for each group. leave; 6 to 12 months with no teaching after department to receive an Athena SWAN Gold returning from maternity leave; making ap- SCHEME award Organisation and culture pointments to cover the teaching of people WORKSHOP • hear from Athena SWAN about the process • A diagram of committees and reporting on maternity leave (rather than saying that of applying for Bronze, Silver and Gold Award 31 October 2013 structures was seen to be a good thing. Some it was covered by existing members of the department status departments had committees, e.g. promo- department). Registration is now open for a Good Practice • hear from departments already engaged in tion and research, entirely made up of male • The panels were keen to hear about staff tak- Scheme workshop to be held on Thursday 31 Oc- the process of applying for Athena SWAN professors that made key decisions -- this was ing paternity leave. tober 2013 in London. status not liked. Careful placing of women on im- The workshop will provide individuals and de- • make useful contacts with other departments portant strategic committees was liked. This is Other comments partments with knowledge and tools they can use active in promoting the careers of women in particularly important for departments with The panels wanted departments to be thinking to improve recruitment and retention of women maths very few women. pro-actively about how to recruit more women in mathematics. This may include making an ap- • Recruitment: give the gender percentages for members of staff. Just adding something to ad- plication for Athena SWAN status. It is aimed at To register for the workshop please email wom- applications, interviewed and appointed. If vertisements (“We particularly welcome female those who have not previously attended a GPS [email protected] (attendance is free, but there are issues, what are your strategies for applicants ...") or having one woman on an in- workshop, although those who have are also numbers are required for catering purposes). addressing them? terview panel was not really seen as sufficient. welcome if they think it would be useful to them. The workshop will be held at De Morgan • Promotions: give the gender percentages of Examples of good practice include: House, 57-58 Russell Square, London WC1B 4HS. applications and success. How do you identify, • LMS Good Practice Scheme supporters can Participants will: The LMS report Advancing Women in develop and mentor women for promotion? show their support for the scheme on their • hear about how the LMS Good Practice Mathematics: Good Practice in UK University • Having Athena SWAN activities recognised in homepage. Scheme can support Departments working Departments is available to download from 14 workload planning (for all the self-assessment • Look at the images on your department's towards recruiting and retaining more women www.lms.ac.uk/women-mathematics or a printed 15 team) would go down very well. It was homepage and in publicity material (e.g. in mathematics copy may be requested from womeninmaths@ thought that the chair [of the Athena SWAN student prospectus). What message do • hear from Paul Walton, former Head of lms.ac.uk. committee] should have a similar allowance they give about gender participation in the to chairs of other major department commit- department? tees -- but it was not clear that this happened • Circulate job advertisements widely, use very often. academic networks and mailing lists, e.g. European Women in Mathematics. Flexibility and managing career breaks • Can staff request flexible working, e.g.’family Action plan friendly lecture times’ (such as no 9am and/or The panels felt that most of the action plans 5pm lectures)? were too vague -- they wanted concrete, realistic • Are all departmental meetings in ‘core hours’ targets. There was an acceptance that if figures (e.g.10am-4pm)? were already above the national average then a • Many departments had informal flexible realistic target might be just to maintain this. working/paternity leave without anything For further information about the LMS Good being requested formally. Practice Scheme see www.lms.ac.uk/women/ • Keeping in Touch days were mentioned a few good-practice-scheme times but there was not much description of A Good Practice Scheme Workshop will be how these were used to help the woman's ca- held on 31 October 2013 where participants will reer (rather than just help the department!).} be able to hear about and discuss the process of • University funded schemes to assist those applying for Athena SWAN. Details are available returning from maternity leave were particu- on the following page and on the website. larly liked. • Does your department have procedures for Peter A. Clarkson giving those returning from maternity leave (Chair of the LMS Good Practice Scheme reduced teaching and administrative loads? Steering Committee) Examples include: reduced teaching loads University of Kent LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

CECIL KING TRAVEL was ultimately a very enjoyable and reward- ing experience. It presented me with an in- SCHOLARSHIP 2012 valuable opportunity to interact with leading Report mathematicians and graduate students in my area of research, which is rather underrepre- It was my great honour and privilege to be the sented in the UK at present. I am very grateful recipient of the 2012 Cecil King Travel Schol- to the London Mathematical Society and Cecil arship. The scholarship afforded me the rare King Memorial Foundation for giving me this opportunity to spend the spring quarter of unique opportunity, and I feel certain that the 2013 as a visiting graduate researcher at the new personal connections and mathematical University of California, Los Angeles. As an al- insights which I acquired during my travel will gebraist with broad interests in the theory of stand to me greatly in the coming years as my torsors and projective homogeneous varieties career develops. under actions of linear algebraic groups over Stephen Scully arbitrary fields, the wealth of leading experts Max-Planck-Institut für Mathematik, Bonn in closely related branches of algebra and al- gebraic geometry which UCLA counts among its faculty made it an ideal choice of host insti- CECIL KING TRAVEL tution for my travel. During my stay, I worked primarily on a project which seeks to investi- SCHOLARSHIP 2013 gate properties of certain invariants of quad- The London Mathematical Society annually 16 ratic forms defined in terms of algebraic cycles awards a £5,000 Cecil King Travel Scholarship 17 on their associated orthogonal Grassmannian in mathematics, to a young mathematician of varieties. This line of research is part of a wider outstanding promise. The scholarship is award- programme of study on discrete motivic in- ed to support a period of study or research variants of projective homogeneous varieties abroad, typically for a period of three months. which has led to great advances in the theory Study or research in all areas of mathematics is of quadratic forms and related structures in re- eligible for the award. cent decades. The principal sponsor of my visit, The 2013 Cecil King Travel Scholarship has Professor Alexander S. Merkurjev, is among been awarded to Andrew Macpherson (Impe- the most renowned experts in this field, and I rial College London), who will visit the Univer- profited greatly from regular discussions with sity of California, San Diego (UCSD). Andrew's him throughout my stay. My visit to UCLA research is into certain geometric constructions in mirror symmetry, a subject that ties together © Archives of the Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach algebra, geometry, and theoretical physics. It is based on an application of non-Archimedean geometry, which is a concept originating in number theory that members of mirror symme- try circles have only recently begun to employ. During his visit to UCSD, Andrew will work with Professor Mark Gross, a world leader in the field responsible for some of its most am- bitious projects. The so-called Gross-Siebert programme outputs, among other things, the affine manifolds associated by mirror symme- try to a degeneration of complex Calabi-Yau varieties. Andrew's work is complementary, at- tempting to give an alternative construction via Stephen Scully the non-Archimedean geometry. LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 426 June 2013

EUROPEAN NEWS to be presented to the Duma in due time. theory, especially in connection to the cel- sideration of an EMS common platform Russian colleagues have formulated a pe- ebrated Nash problem on arcs for surface for European Mathematics. The Chair is Gran Sasso Science Institute tition to President Putin asking him to singularities. The Nash problem, posed by Bernard Teissier (Paris). The GSSI is a newly established interna- make sure that the future law will come in John Nash in 1968, has been one of the In 2002 the EMS launched its Publish- tional PhD school and a centre for ad- place after a thorough consultation with central problems in singularity theory ing House (EMS PH), dedicated to the vanced studies in physics, mathematics, the scientific community. Information: over the last 40 years. In her PhD thesis, publication of high quality peer-reviewed computer science and social sciences, http://save-russian-academy.org . in 2011, Maria Pe constructed a unified journals and books in all fields of math- located in the historical city centre of proof for all quotient singularities of a ematics. Today the EMS PH publishes fif- L'Aquila (Italy). PhD degrees in math- [Source: http://euro-math-soc.eu/node/4028] positive solution to Nash’s problem on teen journals, which are distributed by ematics and physics will be issued jointly arcs. Her thesis contained new techniques the traditional subscription model. This with SISSA-ISAS Trieste. The Institute will EMS Committee for European Solidarity and insights that could be used in a more amounts to approximately 290 full pack- provide students with free housing plus Formerly the Committee for Support of general context. Subsequently, Pe Pereira ages, 2,000 individual subscriptions, 600 the standard three years PhD grant (gross East-European Mathematicians, the Com- and her PhD advisor Javier Fernández de exchange copies, and 600 free copies. 16,160 per annum). The current deadline mittee for European Solidarity will under- Bobadilla solved [the Nash problem] in its Recently, the EMS has appointed a for applications has passed, but further take actions to foster the development full generality.” Publications Committee whose job is to information can be found at www.gssi. of mathematics in economically less-fa- The José Luis Rubio de Francia Prize is give advice to the Executive Commit- infn.it. voured regions within the geographical awarded by the Real Sociedad Matemáti- tee on publications issues, to analyze, to area of EMS membership and through the ca Espa�ola (RSME) under the patronage promote debate, and to keep the math- [Source: http://euro-math-soc.eu/node/3935] following means: of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid ematical community informed about new • Awarding travel grants to young quali- and the Universidad de Zaragoza, and its trends in publications. This allows the Network of International Mathematical fied mathematicians. aim is to recognise and encourage young EMS to take an active role in adopting 18 Centres • Promoting and funding training activi- mathematicians. Recipients should not be new publishing models and to provide its 19 At a meeting in Paris on 1 June this year ties, such as advanced courses or work- older than 32. It is endowed with €3,000 membership with a forum for exchanging four international mathematical centres shops at an early-career level. and carries the invitation to give one of views and ideas. agreed a programme of cooperation: The • Supporting bilateral and multilateral the plenary talks at an RSME Congress. Some of the Committee's practices Abdus Salam School of Mathematical Sci- regional conferences. The jury for this year’s José Luis Rubio de and views on journal publishing are the ences in Lahore (Pakistan), the Centro de • Raising new scientific initiatives. Francia award was chaired by Jesús Baste- following: Investigacion en Matematicas in Guana- • Offering advice and assistance about ro and consisted of Professors Noga Alon, One of the benefits of EMS membership juato (Mexico), the Vietnam Institute for the launching of development projects. Pablo Mira, Gilles Pisier, Marta Sanz-Solé, is free online access to JEMS [Journal of Advanced Studies in Mathematics in Ha- • Easing access to research resources, Agata Smoktunowicz and Cédric Villani. the EMS]. We are currently considering ex- noi (Vietnam) and the Instituto Nacional including digital libraries. More information can be found at www. tending this to other journals. The EMS de Matemática Pura e Aplicada in Rio de Proposals for activities from EMS mem- rsme.es/content/view/1282/1. allows authors of their journals to post a Janeiro (Brasil). In particular, they are ini- bers are greatly welcomed. The Chair of pre-publication manuscript in any non- tiating a program of NIM Fellowships for the Committee is Carles Casacuberta (U. [Source: EMS Newsletter Sept 2013, p. 14] commercial environment, provided prop- PhD students and postdocs of the member of Barcelona), email carles.casacuberta@ er credit is given to the original source. institutions, as well as faculty and staff ub.edu. Abel Laureate interviews On request, the EMS provides authors mobility between NIM Centres. Newsletter readers may be interested in with the final peer-reviewed manuscript, [Sources: EMS Newsletter Sept 2013, pp an extensive interview with Abel Laure- which may be posted on his or her home [Source: http://euro-math-soc.eu/node/4025] 7-8 and www.euro-math-soc.eu/comm ate Pierre Deligne in the EMS Newsletter institution’s non-commercial repository. -eur-solid.html] September 2013, conducted by Martin Through ICTP’s electronic Journal Delivery Russian Academy of Sciences (ctd.) Raussen (Aalborg, Denmark) and Chris- Service (http://ejds.ictp.it/ejds/) all articles In its current session the Russian Duma José Luis Rubio de Francia Prize 2012 tian Skau (Trondheim, Norway). They have from EMS journals are made available free will have to discuss and finally pass a law María Pe Pereira, visiting professor at the together interviewed all Abel laureates of charge to mathematicians in countries on a reform of the Russian Academy of Sci- Université de Lille, has been awarded the since 2003. whose economy does not allow them to ences (RAS) that was originally launched José Luis Rubio de Francia Prize for 2012. purchase subscriptions. Seven of the jour- by the Russian government without con- According to the jury statement support- EMS Publications Committee nals owned or hosted by the EMS are pub- sultations with the scientific community. ing their decision: “María Pe Pereira (Bur- The Committee is preparing a position pa- licly accessible after a five year moving The RAS plans to adopt a declaration sum- gos, 1981) has made some outstanding per on open access (OA) publication that wall. marizing key requests from the scientists mathematical contributions to singularity includes (among many other topics) con- The EMS endorses the general princi- LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

ple of allowing free reading access to clicking on the number of documents a which will also be included soon. Further usual, free access to the first three match- scientific results, and declares that in all certain person has published in a certain technical improvements are already on es of a search query. circumstances, the publishing of an ar- mathematical area brings you to exactly the way. For example, users will soon be We hope that you enjoy the new web- ticle should remain independent of the those documents in our database, where able to set different individual preferenc- site and we welcome any feedback that economic situation of its authors. We you can read reviews or abstracts of the es, such as the display format (eg LaTeX, helps us to improve our service to the therefore do not support any publishing articles and access, in most cases, their MathML, MathJax, PDF), the number of mathematical community. models in which the author is required full texts. presented results or the fuzziness of the We hope that you enjoy the new web- to pay charges (APC). In particular, the The main novelty of the user interface search. site www.zbmath.org. EMS regards the so-called hybrid model is the filter function which helps to re- It is planned to unlock the new zbMATH (journals that publish APC articles along fine the original search by presenting surface in the fall for a limited time Gert-Martin Greuel, with ‘regular’ articles) as unsuitable and the authors, journals, MSC codes and worldwide. Until then, everyone has, as Helena Mihaljevic-Brandt, Olaf Teschke potentially disadvantageous for libraries. publication years according to their fre- It is interesting to note that, so far, the quency. Furthermore, the filter allows to EMS PH has not received a single enquiry formulate search queries that go much about APC publication. further beyond the evaluation of a single publication. For instance, one can quan- [Source: EMS Newsletter June 2013, pp titatively analyse the development in a 3-4] specific field or ask for the most prolific authors in certain journals. David Chillingworth The filter also allows us to better in- LMS/EMS Correspondent terlink the author profiles with the rest 20 of the database. For every author, all co- 21 authors, mathematical areas and journals NEWS FROM zbMATH are displayed according to their frequen- cy, and direct links to the selected pub- More than new clothes lications as well as to the corresponding The reviewing and abstracting service zb- author and journal profiles or the re- MATH (former Zentralblatt MATH), which search fields are available. A timeline of is edited by FIZ Karlsruhe, the European all publications are displayed as a click- Mathematical Society (EMS) and the Hei- able diagram, visualising the author's sci- delberg Academy of Sciences and Human- entific output over the years. ities, offers at www.zbmath.org a new Journals indexed in zbMATH are pre- user interface with improved functionali- sented in a similar fashion. Besides the ties and a user friendly design. obvious advantage for librarians, this in- The new website takes advantage of formation can be valuable for everyone many opportunities offered by modern who wants to evaluate the changes in the browsers, guiding the users quickly to scientific journal landscape. For instance, the required information. The search is PhD students or young researchers might organised in different tabs – documents, profit from consulting a journal profile in authors, journals, classification, software zbMATH in order to decide whether her – allowing to focus on a specific type of or his publication would be well present- information. Our goal was to structure ed there. the information in an easily and intui- As a new facet, the database swMATH, tively comprehensible manner: if you are which provides information on math- interested in author profiles, then you ematical software packages, is now in- use the author tab; whenever you click on cluded in zbMATH and directly linked to an author's name, her or his author pro- relevant publications. A prototype for se- file page is presented; a journal title links mantic formula search is another result of to the corresponding journal profile; and our research and development projects, LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

HEROINES OF COMPUTING touch screens offer intuitive interactive ac- to encouraging more young mon computer file types and cess to videos, photographs, graphics and people to explore the op- very attractively presented A new Women in Computing Gallery, spon- text telling many of the little-known sto- portunities in computing. by web-based screen design sored by Google UK, has been opened ries of women in computing. Artefacts in One of the challenges faced software. at The National Museum of Computing the Gallery include a beautiful reproduc- by girls in particular is a per- Besides Dame Stephanie (TNMOC) on Bletchley Park by technology tion of a scrapbook of Dame Stephanie ceived lack of role models – a Shirley's scrapbook, other entrepreneur Dame Stephanie Shirley. The Shirley's career at F International, the problem we hope this gallery artefacts on display include Gallery highlights the pioneering role that hugely successful company she founded. can help redress.’ comptometers, sophisticated

women have played in the development of © TNMOC Chris Monk, Learning Co- pre-computing calculators computing and has been designed to in- ordinator at TNMOC, ex- operated mainly by women, spire many more girls to take up comput- plained how the women in and memorabilia such as ing as a career. The opening of the new computing theme will be de- the first Assembly language gallery formed part of a Google-inspired veloped at TNMOC: ‘With the programming book, writ- Heroines of Computing event at Bletchley support of Google we have Photo: Robert Dowell ten by Kathleen Booth, a Park involving both the Bletchley Park Trust created this highly dynamic Dame Stephanie Shirley presents a re- trailblazing academic, and production of the scrapbook about her and The National Museum of Computing. gallery which by a few key- career she was presented with by em- a personally-engraved hand strokes can be updated with ployees at her company F International. punch machine of a Miss I.P. © Robert Dowell information and videos as they become Williams who worked on the celebrated Dame Stephanie Shirley cutting the paper tape ribbon (with punched available. At Saturday's event, for exam- Powers-Samas tabulating machines. message Women in Computing) to open the gallery. ple, we collected more of the history Dame Stephanie Shirley in opening the from the pioneers themselves and © James Martin 22 gallery said: ‘Girls must take advantage of already several new videos are now 23 the revival of computing in schools and rec- being edited for display. Women's ognise and grab the opportunities that our part in the history of computing will wonderful sector offers. Britain's economy not be confined to this new Gallery demands that women are not just consum- -- as the Museum grows their stories ers, but rather creators of new technolo- will be embedded throughout the gies and applications. This new Women museum. We encourage anyone with The gallery with six 24" touchscreens displaying intuitive and interactive in Computing gallery at TNMOC will pro- information relevant to the history digital signage. mote positive role models for women and of women in computing to contact us The idea for the gallery was sparked so encourage girls and women in critical at [email protected].’ when the Museum discovered that only thinking and engineering. It shows the The gallery's digital signage tech- 10% of students coming from schools and heroines of computing as historic facts to nology, developed by DSB, is highly Margaret Bullen, one of the wirers of the original Colossi, with the Colossus Rebuild colleges on its ac- inspire the upcom- intuitive with an interface familiar on the day of the gallery opening. claimed Learning Photo TNMOC ing generation.’ to anyone who uses tablet comput- Programme were Peter Barron, ers. Content, hosted in the cloud, can be Guests at the Heroines in Computing female. Together Head of Exter- supplied in a very wide range of com- event included many of the women who with Google the nal Relations at have made outstanding contributions to Photo: James Martin. idea for the new Google said: ‘We the development of computing were pre- TNMOC gallery are delighted to sent including Sophie Wilson, co-designer took shape. have hosted the of the BBC Micro and the ARM chip, Joyce Using the latest Heroines of Com- Wheeler, one of the first academics to use in interactive digi- puting event at a computer (EDSAC) for research, Mary tal signage display Bletchley Park and Coombs the first female commercial pro- technology, the gal- to have sponsored grammer (using LEO), and Margaret Bullen lery presents a mul- this exciting new who worked on the wiring on the original timedia tribute to gallery at TNMOC. Colossus computers. female pioneers of As a company For further information visit the website computing.Six large Dynamic photo electronic montage of women in computing from the Com- we're committed The afternoon soldering workshop was very popular with visitors to the at www.tnmoc.org. puter Weekly archive Heroines in Computing Event. LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

MENTORING AFRICAN RESEARCH IN MATHEMATICS (MARM) Call for prospective mentors

The London Mathematical Society (LMS) and the International Mathematical Union (IMU) in association with the African Mathematics Millennium Science Initiative (AMMSI) are seeking applications for grants to support mathematics and its teaching in universities in Africa. Four mentoring partnerships are to be awarded, each for a duration of two years. The project is designed to counter the mathematics ‘brain-drain’ by supporting qualified mathematics professionals in situ. Continuing professional links to a centre in the developed world, professional mentor- ing and opportunities for periodic research travel will contribute to the possibility and relative attractiveness of contributing one’s mathematical expertise at home rather than moving permanently to the developed world. The MARM awards will focus on building infrastructure and networking in mathematics in Africa. They offer postgraduate scholarships, visiting lectureships and conference support for the benefit of advanced students and young researchers in the mathematical sciences, helping to improve research and graduate 24 education in the longer term. 25 The MARM programme will support mentoring relationships between mathematicians in countries with a strong mathematical infrastructure and their African colleagues, together with their students. Its sharpest focus is on cultivating longer-term mentoring relations between individual mathematicians and students. Thirteen mentoring relationships have previously been supported through a MARM project (funded by the Nuffield Foundation and Leverhulme Trust) in Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. This further initiative aims to build on these successes and to continue to support mathematics in Africa. We are looking for mathematicians interested in being part of these mentoring collaborations. We wel- come applications from those with no prior experience of collaborating with research workers in Africa, as well as from those with existing links with African research. Prospective mentors are asked to indicate any particular institutions (or countries) with which they would like to collaborate, although we naturally cannot make any guarantees. Alternatively, applicants may wish to make a strong case for an existing link. We will expect a willingness to make at least one short visit to Africa and to host a short visit from Africa, as well as a commitment to a continuing mentoring responsibility. The success of the collaborations will be evaluated by asking whether the research collaboration has: • resulted in a mathematical publication in a research mathematics journal of international standing? • produced an MSc or PhD thesis? • formed the basis of an on-going research group? or • resulted in programmatic improvements in or outside support for advanced mathematics at the host institution? To discuss potential partnerships please contact Frank Neumann ([email protected]). Further information is available and submission forms can be downloaded from the LMS website (http:// lms.ac.uk/grants/mentoring-african-research-mathematics). Submission forms should be sent to: Katy Henderson, Council and Society Officer, The London Mathemati- cal Society, De Morgan House, 57-58 Russell Square, London WC1B 4HS, United Kingdom. Email: marm@ lms.ac.uk. Tel: +4420 7927 0809.

The deadline for the receipt of applications is Thursday 31 October 2013. LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

FUNDAMENTALS OF Shared access to this resource may result in Positivity Problem (is the sequence ultimate- MATHEMATICAL agents incurring additional expenses, for ex- ly always positive?), remain open in general COMPUTATION THEORY ample due to excessive wait time. This leads while for some low-order linear recurrence MODELLING IN ECOLOGY Report to a tradeoff between the frequency of ac- systems these problems have been proven to AND EVOLUTION cess to the shared resource and the overhead be decidable. The central topic of this talk Report The 19th international symposium on Funda- costs for individual agents. The nature of the was decidability and computational com- mentals of Computation Theory (FCT 2013) problem can be illustrated on the following plexity of the above mentioned reachability Doing mathematics should be exciting. With was held in Liverpool from 19 to 23 Au- basic dilemma when a group of different problems. In particular the most surprising our knowledge of both the importance and gust 2013 supported by an LMS conference people are heading to an airport after a con- fact, presented by the speaker, is an indirect complexity of living systems accelerating al- grant. This year the 29 papers (26 full pa- ference. Sharing a cab saves overall cost, but argument to highlight the difficulty of these most beyond imagination, rigorous and honest pers and three invited papers) were carefully it may create some inconvenience, or even computational problems. In particular it was mathematics is needed to provide the essential reviewed and selected from 58 submissions. additional expenses, if it results in an early shown that the decidability of either Positiv- unifying structures for both understanding and The papers of authors from 23 countries cov- or late arrival at the airport. The same ef- ity or Ultimate Positivity for integer Linear prediction. No excuse for a dull meeting, then. ered the following topics: algorithms, formal fects appear in more formal systems having Recurrence Sequences of order 6 would en- The 4th bi-annual Mathematical Modelling methods, and emerging fields in theoretical difficult optimization problems due to fre- tail major breakthroughs in analytic number in Ecology and Evolution (MMEE) meeting re- computer science. The proceedings were quent requests to sharing resources. Marek theory, more precisely in the field of Dio- turned to the UK from 12 to 15 August 2013, published in the Lecture Notes in Computer surveyed the existing work on efficient al- phantine approximation of transcendental located in the shiny new Ron Cooke Hub on Science series by Springer-Verlag, volume gorithms for such aggregation problems, numbers. York’s Heslington East campus. The aim was 8070, Leszek Gasieniec and Frank Wolter attempting to provide a unified perspective The third invited speaker was David Peleg to create an inclusive and diverse programme (eds.). In addition, a special issue of Theoreti- and emphasizing connections between dif- (Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, to showcase the latest developments of math- cal Computer Science Journal (Elsevier) will ferent variants. In particular he presented Israel). In 2008, he was awarded the Edsger ematical modelling in evolution and ecology. 26 include the extended versions of selected recently developed offline and online ap- W. Dijkstra Prize in Distributed Computing Adaptive dynamics, bifurcation theory, dynamic 27 papers. proximation algorithms and highlighted a along with Baruch Awerbuch for their 1990 programming, graph theory, individual-based The programme included three invited number of remaining open problems. paper Sparse partitions. He gave a talk on simulations, MCMC, network dynamics, non- talks covering different aspects of algo- The second invited talk was devoted to Randomized Distributed Decision, where a linear PDEs, numerical analysis, statistics, ... the rithmic problems and their computational decision problems for linear recurrence se- central theme in this line of study deals with modern mathematical biologist needs many complexity. quences and was given by Joel Oaknine classifying problems according to their local weapons, and it was inspiring to see the cross- The first invited talk Together or Sepa- (Oxford University). Linear recurrence se- distributed solvability and identifying the fertilisation and mutualistic interaction at work rate? Algorithmic Aggregation Problems quences permeate a vast number of areas relevant parameters governing local solv- between sub-disciplines. was given by Marek Chrobak (University of of mathematics and computer science. How- ability, towards establishing a computational California, Riverside) who mainly specializes ever several fundamental decision problems complexity theory for locality. In this talk he in algorithms and data structures; theory of for linear recurrence sequences, namely the considered the locality of distributed deci- computation; combinatorics and graph theo- Skolem Problem (does the sequence have sion problems and discussed the question ry. Aggregation problems arise when an ex- a zero?), the Positivity Problem (is the se- whether randomness helps in locally decid- pensive resource is shared by multiple agents. quence always positive?), and the Ultimate ing distributed languages. The invited and contributed talks in the FCT 2013 conference were beneficial for re- searchers of all levels and addressed many questions of significant importance bridging mathematics and theoretical computer sci- ence. The exact programme of the confer- ence is still available at the following website http://fct2013.csc.liv.ac.uk/. Fundamentals of Six plenary speakers exemplified both the Computation Theory Meeting is a biennial range of problems tackled and the diversity of series of conferences and the next one will methods used to explore them: take place in 2015 in Gdansk, Poland. • Alasdair Houston (Bristol) Natural selection and irrational behaviour Igor Potapov • Sonia Kefi (CNRS, Institut des Sciences de Marek Chrobak Joel Oaknine David Peleg University of Liverpool l'Evolution de Montpellier) Spatial structure LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

and ecosystems' resilience: insights from increased the probability of) good behaviour drylands from speakers. The efforts of a team of York UG • Drew Purves (Microsoft Research) Modelling and PG unpaid volunteers (and future mathe- all life on earth. Yes, really! matical biologists) were also much appreciated. • Suzanne Alonzo (Yale) The Coevolutionary York did its best to entertain, with a family- and social dynamics of mating and parental friendly (and grimly Scotsman-unfriendly) ghost Care walk, a dinner at the National Rail Museum, and • Mike Brockhurst (York) Coevolution of time to admire the old city. Yorkshire proved microbial interactions: bacteria, phages and that it is indeed the best place in the world, plasmids supplying perfect weather and a microbrewery • Richard Law (York) Of trees and fish: popula- willing to provide liberal and sustained tastings tion dynamics for organisms that grow of MathematicAle and Beer MMEE. The plenaries deserve credit for making their The organisers gratefully acknowledge finan- talks accessible and interdisciplinary without cial support from LMS, the Departments of Biol- trivialising or disguising the mathematics, and ogy and Mathematics at the University of York, for their willingness to engage in discussions, and York Centre for Complex Systems Analysis. and arguments, afterwards. The ubiquity and diversity of mathematics in Jon Pitchford the life sciences was emphasised by a decision to University of York minimise the number of themed sessions – there is no need to be divisive. That said, minisympo- BRITISH POSTGRADUATE 28 sia on FoodWebs and Biodiversity (chair: Axel 29 Rossberg, Cefas) and Search Theory in Biology MODEL THEORY (chair: Tom Lidbetter, LSE) focused in detail on CONFERENCE new and important developments in these two areas. The fourth British Postgraduate Model Theory Student involvement and engagement is Conference (BPGMT) will take place from 13 to paramount, with PhD students showing their 15 January 2014 at the University of Leeds. The excellence in a variety of talks and posters. organisers aim to provide a platform for post- A successful evolutionary step from previous graduate students and postdocs working in and meetings was to “volunteer” PhD students as around model theory to meet and discuss their chairs of sessions of contributed talks. This was work in a relaxed environment. All participants a real success; the virgin chairs got thoroughly are encouraged to contribute a talk or bring involved, asked wise questions, and ensured (or a poster. Although the BPGMT conference is aimed at UK-based students, it is also open to those abroad. There will be a short course given by Dugald Macpherson (Leeds) and plenary talks will be given by Paola D'aquino (Caserta, Italy), Martin Hils (Paris 7; provisional) and Françoise Point (Paris 7/Mons). Further details are available at the conference website www.maths.leeds.ac.uk/~bpgmt2014. Everyone interested in attending this conference is encouraged to pre-register at the website. En- quiries should be addressed to pgmodeltheory@ Supporting local industry and enhancing col- gmail.com. This conference is funded by an LMS laboration via the canonical equation of adaptive Scheme 8 (postgraduate research conference) dynamics. No LMS funds were harmed in the production of this brew. grant and by the British Logic Colloquium. LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

30 31 LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

invariant theory over arbitrary fields OBITUARIES For further information contact Michael Bate DAVID REES ([email protected]). The visit is support- ed by an LMS Scheme 2 grant. Professor David Rees FRS, who was elected a mem- VISIT OF DAVID KREJČIŘÍK ber of the London Math- ematical Society on 23 Dr David Krejčiřík (Academy of Sciences of the May 1946 and who was Czech Republic, Prague) will be visiting the UK awarded the Society’s during October 2013. He works on spectral the- Pólya Prize in 1993, died ory and application in mathematical physics. Dr on 16 August 2013, aged Krejčiřík will give talks on: 95. • 17 October at 3 pm, London Analysis Semi- Rodney Sharp writes: David’s undergraduate nar The semiclassical fall of non-Hermitian studies during 1936-39 at Sidney Sussex Col- quantum mechanics lege, Cambridge, were supervised by Gordon • 18 October at 4 pm, Reading The Brownian Welchman. Although David began postgradu- traveller on manifolds ate work, on semigroup theory, in autumn • 21 October at 3.10 pm, Cardiff The Cheeger 1939, the war intervened. Gordon Welchman constant of curved strips recruited David and other young Cambridge For further details contact Martin Kolb mathematicians to work at Bletchley Park, the ([email protected]). The visit is supported British codebreaking centre, where they be- 32 by an LMS Scheme 2 grant. came part of a team that broke the Enigma 33 code. BRITISH MATHEMATICAL After the war, David was appointed to an Assistant Lectureship at Manchester University, COLLOQUIUM 2014 and then, in 1948, to a University Lectureship The 66th British Mathematical Colloquium will at Cambridge and a Fellowship at Downing take place at Queen Mary University of Lon- College. While at Manchester, and for his first don from 7 to 10 April 2014. Plenary speakers years as a Cambridge fellow, he worked on are: semigroups and other non-commutative alge- • Michael Atiyah (University of Edinburgh) bra. Rees factor semigroups and Rees matrix • Persi Diaconis (Stanford University) semigroups are named after David. VISIT OF BEN MARTIN • Robert Guralnick (University of Southern His life changed following a very successful California) working seminar in Cambridge, organized by Dr Ben Martin (University of Auckland) will be • Thursday 24 October at 4 pm, Algebra Semi- • Ngô B�o Châu (University of Chicago) Douglas Northcott, on Weil’s book Foundations visiting the UK from October 2013 to January nar, Birmingham Geometric invariant theory • Endre Szemerédi (Rutgers University) of algebraic geometry. First, David Rees was 2014. Dr Martin's research area is group theory and spherical buildings • Cédric Villani (Université Lyon 1) so inspired by the seminar that he became a (algebraic groups, complete reducibility, repre- • Wednesday 13 November at 4:30 pm, Alge- • Claire Voisin (École Polytechnique) commutative algebraist. Second, another par- sentation growth of finitely generated groups). bra Seminar, Cambridge • Don Zagier (MPIM Bonn) ticipant in the seminar was Joan Cushen, and During his visit he will give talks on: The local structure of G-varieties In addition, there will be ten morning speak- David and Joan were married in 1952. • Tuesday 1 October at 4 pm, Algebra Seminar, • Tuesday 19 November at 2 pm, Pure Math- ers, as well as afternoon workshops in Com- In David’s first paper in commutative algebra, Manchester Representations of finite groups ematics Seminar, Royal Holloway, University binatorics, Ergodic Theory, Geometry, Group written jointly with Douglas Northcott about in reductive algebraic groups of London G-complete reducibility for reduc- Theory and Number Theory. 60 years ago, they introduced the concept of • Friday 11 October at 2 pm, Pure Mathemat- tive algebraic groups The conference is supported by an LMS Con- reduction of an ideal in a local ring. Even in this ics Seminar, Southampton Complete reduc- • Thursday 21 November, London Algebra ference grant and by Clay Mathematics Insti- 21st century, hardly a conference on commuta- ibility and spherical buildings Colloquium, City University London Maximal tute, and there will be a bursary scheme for tive algebra passes without several mentions of • Thursday 17 October at 10 am, Algebra subgroups of simple algebraic groups PhD students sponsored by Google. For fur- reductions of ideals. Seminar, York Representation growth of • Monday 25 November at 4 pm, Pure Math- ther information visit the conference website David Rees left Cambridge in 1958 to take up finitely generated groups ematics Colloquium, Durham Geometric at www.maths.qmul.ac.uk/bmc2014. a chair at the University of Exeter, where he re- LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

mained until his retirement in 1983. He carried tually taking a post teaching at the Maynard a range of courses there up to his departure to dational work on the subject. Reading the book, out his duties as head of department with care School. In 1965 Joan began 19 years lecturing Bishops Castle. His contribution to both North we see him experimenting in a hands-on fash- and consideration. The associated administra- in David’s Department. Here, as in everything, Region and Wales were highly valued and he ion with what we now call Heegard splittings, tive tasks reduced the time he had available for she was the ideal complement to David’s quiet came with excellent recommendation to us in Morse theory, homology and the fundamental research, but he had a burst of research activity authority. Differential geometry was a par- Wales. group without any of today’s formal defini- after his retirement. ticular joy to her, aided by models including a In Wales, John taught the History of Math- tions. And planning my lecture I can see the David’s fundamental work on valuations paint-stiffened pair of tights to demonstrate ematics Course, MA290, from 1994 up to his problem: even now to set up this apparatus is associated with local rings and ideals, and on saddle points. retirement in 2002. His tutoring was of the a course in its own right and it seems unfair to grade, and his above-mentioned work on re- Joan was quite profoundly deaf from child- highest calibre and he was well liked by both defer a student’s satisfaction until the follow- ductions of ideals, together with the familiar hood. However, very few even noticed how staff and students. His enthusiasm and passion ing year. Poincaré too realizes the limitations (at least for commutative algebraists) expres- heavily dependent she was on her expert lip for the history of mathematics were passed on of his descriptions but nevertheless is eager to sions ‘Rees ring’ and ‘Artin-Rees Lemma’, en- reading. Reflections following a near-fatal to many of his students. I remember talking to communicate his results and defers the proofs sure that his legacy to commutative algebra attack of scarlet fever engendered a deep reli- an arts student who had studied the history of to supplements, correcting and advancing on will be lasting. gious faith and a lifelong devotion to the high mathematic course with John, as an arts course. previous papers. A case in point is the Second David's wife Joan survived him by just twelve end of Anglicanism – ‘anything a bit spiky’, as He said that he had developed a great inter- Complément � l’Analysis Situs published in 1900 days; they are survived by their daughters Mary, she put it. After the family had left home she est in mathematics, a subject he had previously in the Proceedings of the London Mathematical Rebecca, Sarah and Deborah. fulfilled a long-held ambition to convert to Ro- feared, and would be pursuing it further in his Society where he rectifies an earlier result and man Catholicism, subsequently taking a great studies. in so doing introduces torsion in homology. He JOAN REES interest in the local RC schools. In 2002 John told us of his illness and his spends several pages reducing integer matrices Joan was an accomplished watercolourist intention to resign at the conclusion of the to canonical form, (unaware that Henry Smith, Dr Joan Sybil Rees, née and many friends have pictures from her ex- current year. We were saddened by the bad a former President of the Society, had achieved 34 Cushen, who was elected hibitions decorating their walls. Having been news of his illness and also at losing a valued this 40 years earlier) and then stops by announc- 35 a member of the London a Cambridge blue for swimming (and lacrosse colleague. ing a theorem, whose proof he admits requires Mathematical Society on 15 and squash), she became a great devotee of sea further development of the theory. Then, as we June 1972, died on 28 Au- bathing – often in weather that would make learn from the book, further supplements give gust 2013, aged 89. others shudder. For many, the typical image reviews a counterexample to his “theorem” until finally David Oates, aided by was of a well-wrapped Joan sitting at an easel we get what became the celebrated Poincaré Mary and Sarah Rees, writes: on Dawlish Warren beach in a howling gale HENRI POINCARÉ : A Scientific Biography by Jer- conjecture. born to a school-teaching painting happily away. emy Gray, Princeton University Press, 2012, 608 Topology is but one of the many themes in family in Portsmouth on 25 August 1924 and Joan was a great friend and inspiration to pp, £24.95, $35.00 ISBN: 978-0-69-115271-4. Poincaré’s work, some of the other notable ones after some war-time disruption, Joan took up many, remaining her active and enthusiastic I sit at my desk and plan an undergraduate being the global treatment of dynamical systems, a scholarship at Girton College in 1942. Taught self until just the last few months. lecture course on the topology of surfaces. The differential equations and celestial mechanics. by Mary Cartwright and Bertha Jeffreys, and Joan’s husband David died just twelve days inevitable question: can I at the same time sat- He devoted much of his time too to physics and the only woman to get a mathematics first for earlier; they are survived by their daughters isfy the student for whom mathematics is noth- was even considered at one time for the Nobel two years, she began a PhD on Algebraic Ge- Mary, Rebecca, Sarah and Deborah. ing without rigorous proof, and also tell another Prize. This book covers the whole gamut of his ometry with Hodge. This was completed under what interesting things lie ahead? Poincaré works and is sliced up into sections in a rather Dan Pedoe at Royal Holloway College, where JOHN WILSON said: “In becoming rigorous, mathematical sci- unorthodox manner, perhaps reflecting succes- the duties of her lectureship included playing ence …. forgets its historical origins; we see sive lectures by the author on his subject. We be- the double bass left by the previous incumbent. Dr John P. Wilson, who was how questions can be answered, we gin with Poincaré the essayist (today’s Returning to a Fellowship at Girton, she en- elected a member of the no longer see how and why they are advocate of the public awareness of tered into a lifetime as an enthusiastic and in- London Mathematical Soci- put.” Gray’s book attends to those or- science), followed by his life, and then spiring teacher and friend, much loved by her ety on 16 December 1964, igins in a detailed picture of the scien- a succession of thematic chapters cov- students and colleagues. The Fellowship had died on 9 August 2013, tific life and works of this remarkable ering virtually all of his work, some in to be relinquished on marriage to David Rees aged 76. mathematician who was many times areas that this reader was unaware in 1952 and Joan continued as a supervisor be- John Dyke writes: John accused of lack of rigour but whose of. One of the features of the book tween the births of the first three of their four first worked for the Open vision created many new areas of re- is that the author attempts to give an daughters. University in the North Re- search which are active today. outline of many of Poincaré’s proofs After their move to Exeter in 1958, she de- gion in 1973 and taught on our initial math- The case of topology is particularly and methods, without much refer- voted herself to the needs of the family, even- ematics foundation course, M100. He taught relevant because of Poincaré’s foun- ence to today’s approaches. This may LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

be challenging for any reader without a solid book, Games and Mathematics. lines to a parabola omits proof that the line OB research in areas which Turing was to a major mathematical background, but it does give a His writing is still clear and exciting, and he is perpendicular to the directrix. There are a extent responsible for founding. At the same good sense of the mathematics of the time. As has a good deal to say about mathematics and few examples of words slightly misused. One is time these offer a glimpse into the personalities one progresses through the book, this particular about games. He tells us of the mathematics first irked and then amused at his habit of add- of the contributors themselves. past seems far less of a foreign country. that is and is not 'game-like', as well as games ing spice to his narrative, like Shaw, by quoting Naturally this all fills one with a profound The philosophical aspects of Poincaré’s which are and are not mathematical. His ap- himself. sense of Turing’s visionary genius, the sheer thoughts and works are, one suspects, the fa- proach is to show us a broad range of anecdotes But my comments (the margins are wide breadth and depth of his insight and interests, a vourite topic of the biographer perhaps because and examples from game rules, game analysis, enough to contain them) are 'Nice!' and 'Coool!' feeling only enhanced by the care and labor that the essays reveal them, but also because the turn games players, mathematicians and their works many times more often than they are correc- the commentators have devoted to their articles. of the century produced so many issues challeng- in analysis, geometry, number theory and graph tions or queries. Games and Mathematics is an What is surprising here, at least at first sight, is ing the foundations of both physics and mathe- theory. imperfect but very interesting book, and I am that while there are often multiple commentar- matics. For Poincaré mathematics could never be Wells' examples from mathematics are a pleas- very glad to have read it. ies on the same Turing paper there is almost no detached from physics : “the only natural object ure to read: they are not the usual examples repetition or overlap. The inevitable conclusion of mathematical thought is the integer. It is the from popularizations but are less-known results, Steve Wilson one is led to is that Turing’s papers present such external world that has imposed the continuum and he is interested in showing the reader how Northern Arizona University a feast of ideas that there is plenty for all. upon us, which we would have invented with- the original thinking of the mathematician led One point however which does frequently out doubt, but we have been forced to invent.” to the result and in how game-like the structure ALAN TURING; HIS WORK AND IMPACT edited resound in these articles can be summed up by His view on physics, faced with failed theories of the result or its proof is. The book rewards by S. Barry Cooper and Jan van Leeuwen, Elsevier, a quote from Cliff Jones’ essay “The temptation or undetectable phenomena like the ether, was the casual reader who opens the book at ran- 2013, 944 pp, £45.99, ISBN: 978-0-123-86980-7. to ask what might have been? is irresistible”. All that we could never truly understand the primi- dom and reads the explanation of an interesting In the introduction, Barry Cooper, one of too often we read that Turing had intended to tive objects, these would be forever hidden from diagram. These vignettes are generally excel- the co-editors, describes this as a book you can say more on a topic, only to frustratingly pursue 36 us, but “the true relations between these real lent, showing us something new about old facts, browse on the bus or take to a distant scientific a rival interest. The tragedy of his early death 37 objects are the only reality we can attain”. The and showing us some completely new things. meeting. Tongue in cheek presumably, since just short of 42 is ever in the background. objects are replaced by metaphors which have This book also rewards the more sequential with 914 pages and weighing in at over 2 kg it is Since most of the contributions are directly a consistent mathematical meaning and aid reader - it produces a developing thread con- hardly a pocket edition, more at home on a cof- linked to a paper of Turing’s, it is clearly desirable our perception of the real world. Whether he cerning the game-like thinking behind many fee table, and a substantial one at that. to read, or to have read, that paper first. Fortu- would sleep easily nowadays with metaphorical mathematical ideas. This thread is his main In overall structure it is divided into four nately Turing’s papers are in most cases surpris- multiverses and ten-dimensional strings is not so point in this book, and the distinctions he makes parts: Computability and Provability; Cryptol- ingly approachable, in large part, as several of clear. are thoughtful, often surprising. He has writ- ogy, Complexity and Number Theory; Intelligent the contributors point out, because he is often One wonders whether this emphasis on rela- ten a good deal, books and articles, about the Machines; Morphogenesis. So about half could developing ideas from the basics (with scant use tions rather than objects came from his youthful links between games and mathematics, and this be roughly classified as mathematics. Each part of what others might have done!) using relative- encounter with group theory: stepping onto the book is part of that series. It may be that he is so is built around a selection of reprints of Turing’s ly simple mathematics. Nevertheless the extraor- omnibus and realizing with glee that the group accustomed to this connection that he does not papers and notes, published and unpublished, dinary range of topics covered, mathematical of symmetries of hyperbolic space underlay his spell it out well. As a reader of just this one book from North Holland’s four volume Collected notation, statistics, numerical algorithms, phi- work on differential equations. An early experi- of his, it seemed to me that the notion of 'game- Works of Alan M. Turing and in turn each of losophy of mind, the Riemann Hypothesis, com- ence could influence a lifetime’s philosophy. like mathematics' was suddenly the center of his these is accompanied by short contributed com- puters and computability, morphogenesis, …. attention without it ever having been brought mentaries, most around eight pages or so, by means that few readers are likely to immedi- Nigel Hitchin to mine. leading figures in that area. ately fulfil the prerequisites for all University of Oxford Games and Math- What they chose to focus on of them. ematics has a few was apparently left up to them. So As Robin Gandy’s research stu- GAMES AND MATHEMATICS: smaller flaws as well. we find here a wonderful mixture dent in 1969 (Robin was himself Tu- Subtle Connections by David Wells, Cam- In the introduction, ranging from the slightly bizarre ring’s lone PhD student) I had a very bridge University Press, 2012, pp 255, £14.00 the dodecahedron square root of negation to person- minor role scanning for misprints pb, £45.00 hb, ISBN: 978-1-1076-9091-2. in Hamilton's Icosian al Turing anecdotes (like Christos in one of Turing’s less important I first encountered David Wells as an Game is referred to as Papadimitriou’s initial encounter papers for what would eventually editor and contributor to Games & Puzzles an icosahedron. Later, with Turing Machines prompting emerge as a volume of collected Magazine when I was a subscriber, 35-40 an otherwise intensely him to look up the meaning of ‘to works, a task which was certainly years ago. His writing then was clear and clever Archimedean ar- ture’), to scholarly accounts of the not fruitless! The fact that that col- exciting and I was eager to read his current gument about tangent context of Turing’s work, to current lection, started by Robin and finally LMS NEWSLETTER http://newsletter.lms.ac.uk [email protected] No. 429 October 2013

completed by Mike Yates in 2001, took some fictional land of Frenemy, a place where graph CALENDAR OF EVENTS (429) 40 years whilst this latest compilation took just problems arise without any need to define a 15 LMS AGM, London (429) This calendar lists Society meetings and oth- three (and almost hit the target of the 100th graph, because every person is either a friend, or 16 Early Career Mathematicians' IMA er mathematical events. Further informa- anniversary of Turing’s birth in 1912) is to some an enemy, of every other person. Through a con- Autumn Conference, University of Strath- tion may be obtained from the appropriate extent a measure of how our recognition and sideration of the problems that arise in Frenemy, clyde, Glasgow appreciation of Alan Turing has grown over that the book explores the notion of brute-force LMS Newsletter whose number is given in 20 Network Coding, Partitions and Security, period. search, the existence of more intelligent efficient brackets. A fuller list is given on the Socie- Durham It is a rather remarkable achievement that search algorithms, the existence of good approx- ty’s website (www.lms.ac.uk/content/calen- 29 Noncommutative Geometry, Glasgow the editors have managed to engage so many imation algorithms, and of course, the notion of dar). Please send updates and corrections to leading figures, 70 of them in all, and with such NP-completeness and hardest problems. [email protected]. evident commitment, in this project and for the After tracing the history of the P versus NP december 2013 resulting tome (‘volume’ seems too slight a word problem, both in the West and in the Soviet Un- 16 Interfaces between Numerical Analysis here) to be so inexpensive at just £46. It is a fit- ion, Fortnow introduces an interesting and var- OCTOBER 2013 and Computational Statistics, Southampton ting tribute to Turing’s legacy, although surely ied selection of related topics, including Gödel 2 Clay Research Conference, Oxford (425) 16 LMS South West & South Wales not the very last word. sentences, the halting problem, circuit lower 3 University of Oxford's Mathematical Regional Meeting, Swansea (428) bounds, public-key cryptography, quantum com- Institute Opening Conference (425) 16-19 Categorical and Homological Meth- Jeff Paris puting, and a cute zero-knowledge protocol for 4-5 Integrable Systems in Newcastle Meet- ods in Hopf Algebras Workshop, Swansea University of Manchester showing that a Sudoku instance is solvable. This ing, Northumbria University (428) (428) example is very well chosen. It doesn’t require 8 SBCS-FACS Evening Seminar, Philippa 17-19 Workshop on Combinatorial Physics, THE GOLDEN TICKET: P, NP, and the Search for any technical expertise and it is explained in a Gardner Compositional Reasoning for the Impossible by Lance Fortnow, Princeton way that should be comprehensible (and inter- Cardiff Computer Programs, De Morgan House, 38 University Press, 2013, 176 pp, £18.95, US$26.95, esting!) to any intelligent reader. 18-20 LMS Prospects in Mathematics, 39 ISBN: 978-0-69-115649-1. Chapter 2, The Beautiful World, portrays the London (429) Durham University (429) The Golden Ticket is an enthusiastic exposi- author’s fictional vision of the consequences 9 Sheffield Probability Day, Sheffield (428) tion of the P versus NP problem, written for a which would arise from P=NP. This reviewer is 14–18 Quantum Marginals INI Workshop, nontechnical audience. The motivation for the sceptical of many of these, including the cure for Cambridge (425) JANUARY 2014 13-15 British Postgraduate Model Theory book is explained in the dedication. The book cancer, weather predictions a year in advance, 18 Categorically Cardiff: Derived Categories Conference, Leeds (429) is dedicated to the author’s wife and daughters the ability to predict personality from DNA, and and Algebraic Geometry Meeting, Cardiff 17-19 Cryptography and Coding IMA Con- ‘know what I do and why I do it’. This the instant solution to the remain- (428) second aspect – why we do it – is of ing Millennium Prize Problems (a ference, St Anne's College, Oxford 18-19 Lagrange Days: at CIRCM Luminy, primary importance. While one goal consequence labelled ‘outrageous’ France (428) 6-10 Free Boundary Problems and Related of the book is to teach the nontechni- by Bollobás in his January review of 24 Mathematics in Defence IMA Confer- Topics, INI, Cambridge (428) cal reader about the complexity class- the fictional filmThe Travelling Sales- 13-17 Inference for Change-point and ence, Tom Elliot Conference Centre, Qinetiq es P and NP, a much more important man – P vs NP). Since it is unlikely that Related Processes INI Workshop, goal is to explain to the reader why P=NP, it is unlikely that we will ever 26 C* Algebras Meeting, Aberdeen, (428) Cambridge (428) these complexity classes actually mat- experience ‘the beautiful world’, so 29 Mathematics Research Beyond the ter and why it matters whether P=NP. we will probably never know wheth- Blackboard, LMS Computer Science FEBRUARY 2014 Formal definitions of P and NP are er such consequences do arise. This Colloquium, London (429) 10-21 Higher Structures in Algebraic Analy- beyond the scope of the book and can now be bought from www.trav- 29 Oct – 1 Nov Non-Equilibrium Statisti- sis Winter School and Workshop, Padova, these concepts are introduced very ellingsalesmanmovie.com. cal Mechanics and the Theory of Extreme gently. Indeed, in the opening pages, In any case, it is excellent to have Italy (428) Events in Earth Science INI Workshop, NP is said to refer to ‘the problems to which we a nontechnical book about the P versus NP 24-28 Foams and Minimal Surfaces - Cambridge (424) would like to find the best solution’. Without question. The Golden Ticket offers an inspiring 12 Years On, INI Cambridge (429) 31 LMS Good Practice Scheme Workshop, giving definitions, the book proceeds through introduction for nontechnical readers to what 28 Mary Cartwright Lecture, York a sequence of informative examples, followed is surely the most important open problem in De Morgan House, London (429) by a very informal introduction to propositional computer science. MARCH 2014 logic, satisfiability and reductions. Much of the NOVEMBER 2013 31 LMS Northern Regional Meeting, book is written in a fictional style: algorithmic Leslie Ann Goldberg 15 Graphs, Groups & Probability, Warwick Durham problems are introduced in the context of the University of Oxford 15 LMS Graduate Student Meeting, London LMS-FUNDED MEETINGS

Fundamentals of Computation Theory Meeting held in Liverpool from 19 to 23 August 2013 (report page 26)

Mathematical Modelling in Ecology and Evolution Meeting held in York’s Heslington East campus from 12 to 15 August 2013 (report page 27)