The
Australian
Mathematical
Society
(Inc)
Reports for
the
one-hundred-and-twenty-first Council Meeting 2016
Reports on meetings Report from Vice-President (Annual Conferences) Reports from the Society’s subcommittees Reports from Special Interest Groups Report from NCMS Report from AustMS Public O cer Award committee reports
Page 1 of 87 ANZMC8—59th Australian Mathematical Society Annual Meeting Monday September 28 to Thursday October 1, 2015. Vladimir Ejov September 23, 2016
The 59th Australian Mathematical Society hosted by the School of Computer Science, Engineering and Mathematics and Statistics of Flinders University, from Monday September 28 to October, 1, 2015. Thirteen plenary speakers in 2015 - nine international and 4 from Australia- are internationally renowned in their respective fields, including two Fields medalists. Plenary speakers represented a cross-section of mathematics across the world today. Four plenary speakers in 2015 were women. The plenary speakers were Martino Bardi (University of Padova), Manjul Bhargava (Princeton), Aurore Delaigle (Uni- versity of Melbourne), James Demmel (University of California, Berkeley), Jerzy Filar (Flinders University), Clement Hongler (EPFL Switzerland), Frances Kirwan (University of Oxford), Frances Kuo (University of New South Wales), Michael Shelley (New York University), Terence Tao (University of Californiq, Los Ange- les), Ruth Williams (University of California, San Diego), Konstantin Zarembo (Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics), Wadim Zudilin (Newcastle). There were 362 registered mathematicians registered for a four-day program cov- ering a wide range of topics in pure and applied mathematics and statistics. There were 20 special sessions comprising 282 presentations including 13 keynote speakers. The special session organisers worked hard and e↵ectively as they created a high quality meeting. Many of their e↵orts were inspirational and created confidence that Aust MS annual meetings are of consistently high quality. The meeting was preceded by the AustMS Early Career Researcher Workshop held at the new Tonsley campus at Flinders University the Melbourne Parkview Hotel in St Kilda with 75 registered participants, It was organised by Norman Do (Monash University), Pouya Baniasadi (Flinders University) and Dale Ward (Flinders University) and included six invited speakers. The evening program consisted of social events and public lectures. On Sun- day evening the Women in Mathematics Dinner with 82 registered participants was hosted at Tonsley building, Flinders University by the Women in Mathemat- ics Special Interest Group of the Australian Mathematical Society and funded and supported by an ARC Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellowship to Professor Nalini Joshi. On Monday evening there was a Reception at Adelaide Town Hall, followed by public lecture by Terence Tao and Musical Recital conducted by Jan Slo- vak and Ray Booth. On Tuesday night a simultaneous chess competition was held at Flinders University featuring Australia ranked 2 female player Giang Nguyen. The Conference Dinner was held on Wednesday evening at Stamford Glenelg Hotel. The indigenous opening address was read by Auntie Georgina Williams. The conference was opened by the Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science Christ- pher Pine, followed by Flinders University Vice Chancellor Colin Stirling. Also 1
Page 2 of 87 2 participated SA Government representative Katrine Hildyard, SA MP for Elder Annabel Digance and Aust MS President Tim Marchant. This opening ceremony was followed by the announcement of the award of the Australian Mathematical Society Medal to Scott Morrison by Tim Marchant. The talk by the medal winner was given on Wednesday October, 30 during morning plenary session. There were 86 registered students at the conference, many competing for one of the student prizes for best talk. The winners were Matthew Tam (University of Newcastle) for the talk ”Reconstruction Algorithms for Blind Ptychographic Imaging” and and Murray Neuzerling (La Trobe University) for the talk ”‘Using algebra to avoid robots”. The Mathematics Education Special Session was extremely successful. It was one of the largest special sessions at the meeting with 26 registered participants. In combination with the recently created Mathematics Education Special Interest Group of the AustMS this bodes well for the Mathematics Education Special Session in future years. The conference had an income of $??? and expenditure of $??? including re- payment of seed money back to the Australian Mathematical Society. It gratefully received support from the Australian Mathematical Society, the Flinders University, MASCOS and AMSI. I would like to thank all of those who helped to make Aust MS 2015 such a great success. In particular, thanks to the Program Committee members, the special session organisers, the local organisers, the ECR workshop organisers, the sta↵and student volunteers in the School of Computer Science, Engineering Mathematics at Flinders University, John Banks for setting up the registration system; all played a vital role in the smooth running of the conference. Special thanks to the Australian Mathematical Society and Flinders University for supporting this conference in various ways. The next annual meeting is being hosted by ANU. I wish John Urbas and his team all the best in their preparations for the 60th Annual Meeting.
Page 3 of 87 The 2015 Early Career Workshop of the AustMS, Budget Report 27 October 2016 Aims The Early Career Workshop (ECW) of the Australian Mathematical Society (AustMS) is intended for graduate students and early career academics working in the mathematical sciences. The workshop brings these people together to discuss issues concerning ECRs in the mathematical sciences and to obtain valuable career advice through various presentations, panel discussions, and other activities. Organisers Michael Coons (University of Newcastle, AustMS Early Career Representative) Norman Do (Monash University, AustMS Early Career Representative) Dale Ward (Flinders University, local organiser) Dates and Host Flinders University hosted the event at their Tonsley Park Campus. The upshot of this is that they processed all of the necessary catering payments for the ECW and (presumably) invoiced AMSI and AustMS after the event. Demand The number of participants for the ECW has been relatively high in recent years, with 57 registered participants in 2012, 64 in 2013, and 73 in 2014. Recall that starting in 2015, the standard ECWs will now be held only in even years. As 2015 was an odd year, it was decided that a shorter one-day workshop would be held. As this was the first ‘short workshop’, we could only assume that the demand would be constant, so assumed around 70 participants. We planned, and to the best of my knowledge paid, for that number. Format We followed a similar format to the previous workshops, but with three speakers. They were Bj¨orn R¨u↵er (Newcastle), Anne Thomas (Sydney), and Timothy Trudgian (ANU). During the forum, we were fortunate to have Scott Morrison (ANU) join us. The topic was ‘Research’ as broadly defined. Budget summary The budget for the 2015ECW was a real issue. No preliminary budget was given or agreed upon; the funding was only agreed upon as we were negotiating with caterers. There is no total amount approved, but only the bid for $44 per person for catering and a $600 budget for dinner. For dinner, because of the Sunday workshop, there was a huge overlap with the Women in Maths Dinner, so I just took the remaining people to a local pub. We were fortunate that all of the speakers and organisers had other funds, so that the ECW did not incur any costs for speakers other than gifts—a bottle of South Australian shiraz for each of them (3).
Item Cost Catering (excluding dinner, 70 people) 3080.00 Dinner at local pub (15 people) 347.00 Gifts 92.97 Total 3519.97
Final comment After dealing with the budgets and organising this even for one-day (really only a ‘fat half day’), I don’t think that these smaller odd-year workshops are worth it. We had many people sign up and not many come, probably about 50 of the 70 showed up. The quality of the conversations was good, but everything was too rushed with ECW the afternoon before the main meeting. In the future, I suggest putting all of the e↵ort into the even-year main ECWs.
1 Page 4 of 87 SECOND EARLY CAREER WORKSHOP OF THE AUSTRALIAN MATHEMATICAL SOCIETY HELD IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE ANZIAM CONFERENCE
6 – 7 FEBRUARY 2016, QT CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA
Melanie Roberts, Roslyn Hickson, Leesa Sidhu
PURPOSE The purpose of the Early Career Workshop (ECW) is to support Early Career Mathematicians (ECMs) in their career development, through an event that fosters networking and professional development, as well as to encourage membership of ANZIAM and the Society and participation in the ANZIAM conference.
TARGET AUDIENCE The Early Career Workshop is open to members of AustMS, or the ANZIAM division through the New Zealand Mathematics Society, within 5 years of conferral of their PhD. This includes current research higher degree candidates. Career interruptions are recognised and considered on a case-by-case basis.
BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ECW The ECW arose from a proposal made at the 51st Annual AustMS meeting at La Trobe University in 2007. It was suggested that an annual workshop be held in conjunction with the Annual Meeting.
In 2014 the ECW was held in conjunction with the ANZIAM meeting for the first time. The ECW now alternates between the ANZIAM meeting and AustMS meeting on a bi- annual basis, with both workshops being held in conjunction with the conferences held in even years. The locations of past meetings are as follows:
Page 5 of 87 • 2009 Adelaide, South Australia • 2010 Caloundra, Queensland • 2011 Wollongong, New South Wales • 2012 Ballarat, Victoria • 2013 Leura, New South Wales • 2014 Rotorua, New Zealand [first ANZIAM workshop] • 2014 Melbourne, Victoria • 2016 Canberra, Australian Capital Territory [second ANZIAM workshop]
ORGANISING COMMITTEE • Melanie Roberts, IBM Research – Australia (Chair and ANZIAM Early Career Representative) • Roslyn Hickson, IBM Research – Australia (immediate past ANZIAM Early Career Representative) • Leesa Sidhu, UNSW Canberra (local organiser)
PROGRAM The ECW was held over the Saturday and Sunday immediately prior to the ANZIAM conference. The program consisted of three sessions with two panels, with a focus on understanding career opportunities in academia and industry and developing skills to improve opportunities for current students and recent graduates. The Saturday afternoon session focused on developing research careers in academia and industry, with speakers Prof. Peter Taylor and Dr Jane Sexton, including a panel discussion and a practical activity. Sunday consisted of two sessions, with Dr Adelle Coster and Dr Michael Plank speaking on establishing collaborations, and Dr Steve Barry and Dr Melanie Roberts on interviewing for technical positions in industry with a practical activity. The panel sessions involved all speakers and organisers as well as Ms Alexandra Hogan. Please see the attached program for complete details of the workshop.
ORGANISERS’ COMMENTS The Early Career Workshop was a successful event, bringing together early career mathematicians for two half-days of networking and professional development. The informal feedback we received from participants during the workshop and ANZIAM
Page 6 of 87 conference was positive, as was the feedback from a survey completed by participants (see section on Participant Feedback). Below is a selection of comments that demonstrate the value of the workshop to participants:
“Without exception every session was immensely valuable, and the workshop was very well organised.”
“It was very informative. I learnt a lot about future career choices and about life in academia and industry in general.”
“You can have an academic career and still have a life”
“People with different lifestyle choices/priorities can take different career paths and be successful -- there is no 'one way' to be a good researcher.”
“Research and an academic career should be fun!”
“There is a lot of variety to be had in an academic career”
“People with different research backgrounds can bring really different perspectives to the table”
“There are many pathways, and many interesting problems to solve”
In response to feedback from previous workshops, we sought to include speakers at all stages of their career and from a variety of backgrounds. In particular, we considered gender balance, inclusion of mathematicians from industry and academia, and a diversity of career paths. This diversity was appreciated by the participants, as reflected in the comments of two participants:
“I particularly enjoyed having a range of experience levels on the panel - from PhD candidates through to professors. And the career path of each speaker was varied and different, allowing me to envisage my own career path in many different ways!”
“This year's mix was great, i.e. ECR to professors and almost equal academia/industry!”
Page 7 of 87 Participant numbers were lower than expected (at 24 participants), especially in comparison with previous years, and only one student from New Zealand attended. Although the registration site opened early and registrations were initially strong, they did not continue as expected. It is suggested that in future the organising committee liaises with the ANZIAM Conference committee to enable registration for the workshop in conjunction with the conference registration. It is not well understood why registrations were low, however we did receive feedback that some did not attend due to the additional night’s cost in accommodation, while other PhD students thought the workshop was not for them. It is recommended that in future care is given to the description of the workshop to ensure that postgraduate students are directly mentioned, along with other ECMs.
We feel that holding the workshop prior to the conference was advantageous for the participants, as they were able to put into practice what they learnt at the workshop. This also made the conference more welcoming, particularly for those new to ANZIAM. Participants commented that they “[felt] more confident”, were “more relaxed" about their presentation and “talked to a wider variety of people” as a result of attending the workshop. One participant indicated that they applied for an ECR grant as a direct result of their workshop participation.
The majority of participants were PhD students, with a small number of postdoctoral researchers and other ECMs. While the program is very valuable to current research higher degree students, we feel that ECMs who have completed their studies are not being well served through the current program, which should be considered further.
FINANCIAL REPORT Thanks to the financial support from AMSI, AustMS and ANZIAM, together with presenters self-funding all or part of their attendance, the workshop was able to be offered free of charge to all participants. The final budget is detailed below:
Venue Fees $1000.00* Catering – venue $2800.00* Catering - dinner $510.90
Page 8 of 87 Gifts – presenters $304.30 Accommodation – presenters $625.00 Chocolates – participants $12.69 Total $5252.89
*The venue fees, catering at the venue, as well as expenses for audio equipment and printing of name tags were all absorbed within the ANZIAM 2016 budget.
Accommodation for presenters:
• $220.00 for one night’s accommodation for Melanie Roberts • $220.00 for one night’s accommodation for Roslyn Hickson • $185.00 for one night’s accommodation for Adelle Coster
The committee thanks all presenters for self-funding their travel to the workshop, and Peter Taylor and Michael Plank for self-funding their accommodation.
PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK Feedback from participants was overall positive. The venue and facilities were rated well by participants, and overall all sessions were found to be of interest and relevant to participants as individuals, and felt to be relevant and of interest to a general audience of Early Career Mathematicians.
A summary of key feedback points is included below, with a full summary of all responses provided in the attached document.
The workshop was highly rated overall, with all respondents rating the workshop Good (42%) or Very Good (58%). The mix of academic and industry presenters were well received, with the majority of respondents indicating that they found the talks interesting and useful to themselves, but also relevant to people seeking a career in both industry and academia.
In the survey participants were asked to comment on the key message of the presenters. As the survey happened after the conference, we feel that the responses received demonstrate that strong messages were delivered by the presenters, and that the same presenter appealed to different participants in a variety of ways.
Page 9 of 87 Respondents were asked to indicate topics that would be of interest in future workshops, as well as the mix of speakers they would like to see. Their comments included:
Topics:
• How to write a grant application. Maybe done in the same style as the job applications thing... • I'd be interested in a presentation on fellowships versus postdoctoral positions, as well as something about applying for research positions overseas. • Work/life balance when trying to build a career? • Same as this year, maybe more on developing a professional identity • It might be good to get some tips on giving a conference presentation - not really obvious stuff, but more subtle tips from people that are particularly good at them.
Speakers:
• I'd prefer more academics but for the whole audience you got a good mix. • I'd be interested in hearing from a speaker who has pursued a teaching-based academic career. • Much like this workshop, a mix of ECR and more senior researchers in academia and research industry -- perhaps also representatives from non-research industry. • This year's mix was great, i.e. ECR to professors and almost equal academia/industry! • Same as this year • I think the mix was ok at ECW2016. Some thought about who from industry might have useful experiences and give a good presentation might be worthwhile.
Page 10 of 87 REPORT ON PREPARATION FOR AUSTMS 2016 ANNUAL MEETING: AUSTRALIAN UNIVERSITY MONDAY, 5 DECEMBER TO THURSDAY 8 DECEMBER, 2016 Second Report 27 October 2016
Preparations are proceeding on schedule. The local organising committee comprises Vigleik Angeltweit, Joan Licata, Lucia Lu (who has taken over from Brittany Joyce who is on maternity leave) and John Urbas (conference director).
• Two plenary speakers, Miranda Cheng and Simon Levin, have withdrawn, Miranda because of a new baby, and Simon because of knee replacement surgery. The eleven remaining plenary speakers have confirmed they will attend. Accommodation has been arranged on campus. The plenary lectures will be held in the main lecture theatre of the Manning Clark Centre, which seats approximately 500. Refreshments and lunch will be served in the Manning Clark foyer.
• This year, instead of a public lecture, Terry Speed will give a special memorial lecture on the life and work of Peter Hall, to be held on the evening of Tuesday 6 December. This time has been chosen to allow participants of the Australian Statistical Conference 2016 to attend. This conference will be held in Canberra at the same time as AustMS 2016, so it is an appropriate joint event to commemorate Peter’s work. Jeannie Hall has accepted an invitation to attend.
• As of today there are 250 registrants. We expect to the final number will be around 350 to 400.
• 21 special sessions, a poster session, and an education afternoon have been arranged. So far there are about 140 registered talks. We have booked 17 lecture rooms of various capacities for the special sessions. The ANU has generously agreed to waive the room hiring fees, resulting in a saving of over $20,000.
• The Early Career Workshop will be held at the Academy of Science on Saturday/Sunday 3-4 December.
• The Women in Mathematics Dinner will be held in the Great Hall of University House. As well as $5000 provided by Nalini Joshi, the WIMSIG has secured $2000 in funding from the Australian Signals Directorate.
• There will be a reception at Fellows Garden at University House on Monday 5 December, starting around 6pm. In case of wet weather, the reception will be in the Great Hall.
• The conference dinner will be at QT on Wednesday evening, 7 December. This is a ten minute walk from the ANU campus. The dinner will be held jointly with the Australian Statistical Society, so we expect it to be a somewhat bigger event than usual. It is difficult to give an estimate of final attendance at this stage because registrations from the statisticians are rather low so far.
Page 11 of 87 • The council meeting on Sunday 4 December will be held in University House.
• The AGM is scheduled for Wednesday 7 December during the lunch break.
• AMSI is organising a barbecue on the afternoon of 8 December at the conclusion of the meeting.
• The income from registrations currently stands at around $102,000. The Australian Signals Directorate has offered an additional $3,000 (this is still to be confirmed). I have only today learned of the capitation fee. Assuming our final registration numbers and income are similar to last year’s, I expect we will be able to return at least $35,000 to the society.
John Urbas AustMS 2016 Conference Director 27 October 2016
Page 12 of 87 The 2016 Early Career Workshop of the AustMS Pre-Meeting Update 4 Novemember 2016 The Early Career Workshop (ECW) will be held on the weekend of 3–4 December 2016, preceding the 60th Annual Meeting of the AustMS at the Australian National University. Organisers Michael Coons (University of Newcastle, AustMS Early Career Representative) Norman Do (Monash University, AustMS Early Career Representative) George Willis (University of Newcastle, Fellow of AAS)1 Host The ECW will be held at the Shine Dome of the Australian Academy of Sciences. Participants will be housed at Burton and Garran Hall on the ANU campus. Financial and planning assistance is being provided by the MSI at the ANU. John Urbas and the MSI sta↵have been extremely helpful; the ECW has benefitted extremely from the help and care of the MSI sta↵and the sta↵of Burton and Garran Hall. Demand The number of participants for the ECW has been relatively high in recent years, with 57 registered participants in 2012, 64 in 2013, and 73 in 2014. We expect interest in the 2016 ECW to be smaller than that of the Melbourne ECW (2014) given that the 2016 AustMS will not be held in a major city. Our preliminary budget (below) is based on the expectation of 65 participants: 57 PhDs/ECRs, 6 speakers and 2 organisers. Format We will invite six speakers in total, comprising three early career researchers and three career advice speakers. As in the previous two years, the early career researchers will be encouraged to give presenta- tions on their research with the backdrop of their own career trajectories. The theme of the workshop is “addressing your audience.” The speakers are
Danesh Jogia (DSTG) • Masoud Kamgarpour (Queensland) • Matthew Kennedy (Waterloo, ECR Plenary) • Giang Nguyen (Adelaide) • Jacqui Ramagge (Sydney) • Aidan Sims (Wollongong) • Budget summary We were granted 18,000AUD, subject to submission of a detailed proposal to be submitted later. As of now, we are under budget, but last minute things may come up and put us closer to our budget limit. We are keeping a detailed list of expenditures with the help of Lucia Lu (MSI Research Administrator).
1Prof. Willis has been added to the list of organisers for the sole benefit of getting a 25% discount on the venue—members of the Academy are entitled to this discount.
1 Page 13 of 87 REPORT ON PREPARATION FOR AUSTMS 2017 ANNUAL MEETING: MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY TUESDAY 12th - FRIDAY 15th DECEMBER, 2017
This report covers preparations for the AustMS 2017, to be held at Macquarie University Tuesday 12th to Friday 15th December.
The Program Committee was formed in late 2015 and comprises: Julie Clutterbuck (Monash University) Xuan Duong (Macquarie University) Gary Froyland (UNSW) Vladimir Gaitsgory (Macquarie University) Jan De Gier (Melbourne) Giang Nguyen (University of Adelaide) Cheryl Praeger (University of Western Australia) Jacqui Ramagge (University of Sydney) Paul Smith (Macquarie University) Ole Warnaar (University of Queensland)
After correspondence with a number of suggested speakers to ascertain availability, the final list of individuals who have accepted invitations to give Plenary Lectures is as follows.
International Speakers Georgia Benkart University of Wisconsin– Representation theory and Lie algebras Madison, USA Young-Ju Choie Pohang University of Automorphic forms, automorphic Science and Technology, representations, number theory South Korea Ivan Corwin Columbia University, Integrable probability USA Helene Frankowska Université Pierre et Non-linear control, viability theory, set-valued Marie Curie, Paris 6, analysis France Steve Hofmann University of Missouri, Harmonic analysis USA Andrei Okounkov Columbia University, Representation theory USA Maryna Viazovska Humboldt University of Number theory, discrete geometry Berlin, Germany
National Speakers Yihong Du New England Non-linear PDEs Catherine Greenhill UNSW Graph theory, random algorithms Phil Pollet Queensland Applied probability Michael Small UWA Complex systems Hans De Sterk Monash Computational mathematics
Page 14 of 87 We consider this choice of speakers provides a good balance of genders, research fields and geography. In addition there is the ANZIAM speaker for AustMS-2017, to be advised by the ANZIAM Invited Speakers Committee shortly.
The local organising committee so far comprises Paul Smith (co-Director), Xuan Duong (co-Director), Richard Garner (Treasurer), Steve Lack (Secretary), Christine Hale (Administrator), Ji Li, Ross Moore (Website & IT), Frank Valckenborgh, and Elena Vynogradova. Additional members will be recruited towards the end of the year, as required.
Local arrangements are progressing well. We are pleased to report that appropriate rooms for the Plenary Sessions and for the parallel sessions have been secured on campus. The Macquarie Theatre (capacity approximately 500) is suitable for the plenary lectures, and 20 other nearby lecture rooms suitable for parallel sessions (each of capacity 50-60) are now reserved for the duration of the conference; one room for the AustMS Council business meeting on Monday 11th is likewise secured.
Arrangements for bank accounts, the creation of the webpage, the conference dinner will commence soon; arrangements for accommodation, advertising posters, the ECR workshop immediately preceding the conference AustMS 2016, the Women in Mathematics event, and other planning matters will start late this year and early 2017.
Paul Smith & Xuan Duong AustMS 2017 Conference Directors 27 October 2016
Page 15 of 87 1. Report to Council from the Vice President (Annual Conferences) 2016
Matter for Discussion by the Council. I would like to request the Council to discuss the matter of having an ECR representative on the Program Committees of the AustMS meetings.
The name of the ECR member of the PC of the AustMS meeting in the year x+2 can be provided by the PC of the ECR Workshop in the year x.
60th Annual Meeting, 2016. The meeting is to be held at ANU in Canberra from 5 to 8 December. The preparation for the meeting is well on track, and all relevant information available at this stage (plenary speakers, the conference program, etc.) can be found on the conference webpage.
I would like to thank the Conference Director John Urbas and all members of the Local Organizing Committee for their time and efforts. I would also like to thank John Banks for his role as the conference webpage carer .
Note that this year, instead of a public lecture, we will have Peter Hall memorial lecture that will be delivered by Terry Speed.
Note also that this year AustMS meeting will be accompanied by two satellite Mathsfest Workshops one before the meeting (Advances in Ergodic Theory, Hyperbolic Dynamics and Statistical Laws, 28 Nov – 2 Dec) and one straight after the meeting (Nonlinear and Geometric Partial Differential Equations, 9-13 Dec).
61th Annual Meeting, 2017. The 61th Annual meeting will be held at Macquarie University from 12 to 15 December 2017. The Directors of the meeting are Xuan Duong and Paul Smith.
The Program Committee has selected twelve plenary speakers. They have been invited and they have accepted the invitations. These are: Georgia Benkart (Wisconsin, USA), Ivan Corwin (Columbia University, USA), Young-Ju Choie (South Korea), Hans De Sterk (Monash), Yihong Du (New England), Helene Frankowska (Paris 6, France), Catherine Greenhill (UNSW), Steve Hofmann (University of Missouri, USA), Andrei Okounkov (Columbia University, USA), Phil Pollet (UQ),Michael Small (UWA), Maryna Viazovska (Humboldt University of Berlin). We also expect to receive the name of the ANZIAM plenary presenter soon.
62nd Annual Meeting, 2018. Subject to the approval by the Council, the 62th Annual Meeting of the AustMS will be held at the University of Adelaide in December 4-7, 2018. The AustMS Steering Committee has pre-approved Dr Thomas Leistner as the Director of the meeting and ratified the composition of the Program Committee. The names of the PC members are as follows: Ben Burton (UQ), Alan Carey (ANU), Julie Clutterbuck (Monash), Alice Devillers (UWA), Peter Forrester (Melbourne), Gary Froyland (UNSW), Vlad. Gaitsgory (Maquarie), Thomas Leistner (Adelaide), Giang Nguyen (Adelaide), Jacqui Ramagge (Sydney), Lesley Ward (UniSA)
Vlad Gaitsgory, VP(AC)
Page 16 of 87 Report for AustMS Council on the activities of the Standing Committee on Mathematics Education in 2016
The members of the standing committee in 2015/2016 are: Birgit Loch (Chair; Swinburne University of Technology) Amie Albrecht (South Australia; University of South Australia) Philip Charlton (New South Wales; Charles Sturt University) Heather Lonsdale (Western Australia; Curtin University) Lilia Ferrario (Australian Capital Territory; Australian National University) Des Fitzgerald (Tasmania; University of Tasmania), now Kumudini Dharmadasa (Tasmania; University of Tasmania) Deb King (Victoria; University of Melbourne) Barbara Maenhaut (Queensland; University of Queensland) Katherine Seaton (AustMS PD unit coordinator, Latrobe University)
Activities in 2016: The committee met twice via Skype over the year (in November 2015 and June 2016), with another meeting planned in November 2016, and will continue to meet online twice a year. Items discussed and resulting activities:
• Standing Committee membership changes. Council voted to include the coordinator of the AustMS PD unit as a member on the Standing Committee, so we welcomed Katherine Seaton to the Committee. Alice Devillers (UWA) stepped down from her role as WA representative at the end of her term, and was replaced by Heather Lonsdale (Curtin University). Heather was welcomed to the Committee. Des Fitzgerald announced his retirement from the Committee. Kumudini Dharmadasa has just commenced as Tasmania representative on the Committee. We would like to thank both Alice and Des for their contributions to the Standing Committee over the last years.
• Revision of the Program Review scheme. Last year, interest was expressed by Committee members to involve the Standing Committee in this revision, as the Program Review was seen as very important particularly for universities with small mathematics departments. In addition, twice, the Standing Committee Chair was approached this year by representatives from Mathematics Departments, requesting information on expected standards for a mathematics degree, showing the importance of re-establishing the program review scheme. We are awaiting further advice on next steps from the new Chair of the Program Review working party, Tim Marchant.
• Accreditation as teaching fellow. Teacher accreditation was discussed at last year's AustMS Council meeting as a direction Council would like to investigate further. Katherine explained the history of trying to establish such an accreditation, based on the PD unit. Some universities are allowing it as a unit in their graduate certificate of teaching and learning. Successful participants are also given a certificate. No formal TAustMS or similar accreditation currently exists. The Committee considered the possibilities of adopting the UK’s Higher Education Academy teaching fellowship scheme and the HERDSA scheme. The Chair discussed the differences between the two schemes with A/Prof Chris Tisdell from UNSW, who has experience with both schemes. The HERDSA fellowship is very difficult to achieve, there are only about 30-40 fellows in total, and it is a laborious process. Teaching excellence is the main criterion. The HEA (UK) fellowships allow accreditation at different levels, and are awarded on the basis of demonstrated competence. This might be more appropriate for AustMS teaching accreditation. Some universities are already using the HEA scheme for their staff, e.g. the ANU: https://services.anu.edu.au/training/anu-educational-fellowship-scheme. The Standing Committee plans to form a small working party to put forward a proposal to Council, for example based on existing accreditation (HEA), modified accreditation, the AustMS PD unit, or following a completely different path.
Page 17 of 87 • The ALTC/AustMS PD unit. This unit was funded by an ALTC grant in 2009-2011 under the lead of Leigh Wood, supported by the AustMS. It is hosted on the AustMS wiki, and coordinated by Katherine Seaton. Enrolment is free for any member of the society. This unit is the responsibility of the Standing Committee after it was handed over by Leigh Wood last year. o Unit content update. The material is getting out of date as it was written 6 years ago and teaching approaches and technology have moved on. Enrolments have been low, as many mathematicians who start the unit find they are too busy with other tasks, and at many universities this unit cannot be taken as an elective in graduate certificates for learning and teaching or to replace teaching induction courses. A funding application was submitted to the Office for Learning and Teaching in 2015 for a $30,000 extension grant, with co-funding approved by AustMS Council of $10,000, to increase participation in the unit by updating its content, undertaking an active advertising campaign, and taking a national approach to embedding it in graduate certificates of teaching and learning. Supporting letters were included from the Australian Council of Deans of Science (ACDS) and the AustMS. The project team consisted of Birgit Loch as Chair of the Standing Committee and member of the original project team, Katherine Seaton as the unit coordinator, Diane Donovan as a member of the original project, Lilia Ferrario, Philip Charlton and Amie Albrecht as Standing Committee members. Unfortunately, this bid was unsuccessful. Since then, a proposal was approved by Council to provide $8,000 to undertake the urgent updating of the content, revisiting of the description of teaching technologies and inclusion of recent approaches to teaching such as blended learning and the flipped classroom. Katherine Seaton and Birgit Loch are leading this update which is anticipated to be completed by mid-2017. o Recruitment strategy. Once the material is updated, a better advertising strategy needs to be found as emailing via the AustMS and ACDS lists appears to have little effect. As a first step, we are considering to hand out flyers at relevant mathematical conferences in December including the AustMS conference), and present at the Heads of Mathematics meeting in February on the benefits of participation in the unit to mathematics lecturers and tutors. Another approach would be a “naming competition” to raise awareness of the unit, and give it a more appealing title.
• Induction unit for ANU science tutors. Lilia Ferrario and her ANU colleague Beth Beckman have extracted parts from the AustMS PD unit that are relevant to tutors. This material has been used for the first time in semester 1 this year at the ANU to induct new tutors, in combination with face to face induction. This program is currently being evaluated. Standing Committee members reported a range of approaches to tutor training, often non-discipline based. This tutor unit was seen as useful beyond the ANU, or at least parts of the unit could be integrated locally. The original ALTC-funded material was released under a Creative Commons license that allows changes to be made to material with the understanding that the modified material is released back to the community under a Creative Commons license. Katherine Seaton and Birgit Loch have just been given access to the material and will investigate how the material may be released back, and what, if any, changes may need to be made so it is relevant to the community.
• 2016 AustMS Conference. The Standing Committee is investigating if it is possible to reinstate a teaching PD session at the AustMS conference. From 2010, a workshop on teaching PD followed the AustMS conference for a couple of years, as part of the outcomes of the ALTC project that resulted in the PD unit. Rather than a full day after the conference, this could be the free evening, with a guest speaker, over a meal.
• Additional activities planned by the Committee. o Regular educational articles in the Gazette. Standing Committee members will suggest to colleagues to contribute educational articles or contribute articles themselves. Suggested topics were the preparedness for university, lectures, lecture recording, blended learning, casualization of teaching, electronically invigilated exams (with 360 degree cameras), online assessment in general, interactive tools but also resistance to change. Another topic suggested is the new VCE curriculum in Victoria, to make AustMS members aware of the changes that are coming from next year. For example, students will no longer learn about the absolute value function before entering university mathematics. The Gazette editors have agreed to consider regular articles from the Standing Committee.
Page 18 of 87 o Creation of a Standing Committee website on the AustMS Wiki, containing mathematics education related information of interest to AustMS members.
Page 19 of 87 Report of the ACCREDITATION COMMITTEE of the Australian Mathematical Society 2015-2016
Accreditation Committee membership: Brailey Sims (UoN) - Chair Benjamin Burton (UQ) Ian Doust (UNSW)
The Council’s decision to offer Fellowship to high profile members of the mathematical sciences (including those newly admitted to the Australian Academy of Science) together with an initiative by the President (Professor Tim Marchant) to personally invite all relevant level E academics to seek membership and Fellowship of the Society resulted in a “bumper crop” of Accreditations, particularly of new Fellows, during 2014 -15 [see my previous report]. The continued pursuance of these strategies over the last 12 months has produced a pleasing and one hopes sustainable number of new Fellows. However, the number seeking Accreditation at the lower levels of MAustMS and GAustMS remains disappointingly small.
The period September 2015 to October 2016 has seen 13 successful (and no unsuccessful) applications for accreditation:
FAustMS (11) Richard I HARTLEY Bruce HENRY Birgit LOCH Malcolm SAMBRIDGE Noel F SMYTH Susan SCOTT Fedor SUKOCHEV Christopher TISDELL Matthew P WAND Robert WILLIAMSON David R WOOD
MAustMS (1) Melanie E ROBERTS
GAustMS (1) Imededdine JERBI
The Committee applauds the President for undertaking a revamp of the Accreditation pages of the Society’s web site, which has rendered them more relevant and informative for prospective applicants from both academic and non-academic circles.
Page 20 of 87 Building on the initiatives outlined above the Committee recommends that:
The Council establish a working party including representatives from industry and the teaching profession to investigate ways to increase the utility and popularity of Accreditation by the Australian Mathematical Society especially at levels other than that of Fellow, including the possibility of new, or rebadged, levels of accreditation.
Once again, I must record my indebtedness to May Truong and Peter Stacey for their invaluable support without which the Committee could not function. Thanks also Tim Marchant for his continued efforts to promote the Society’s accreditation program and to my fellow Committee members for their valuable input. Special thanks to Elizabeth Billington for her many years of diligent service on the Committee, and welcome to Ben Burton who has taken over her role.
Brailey Sims Chair Accreditation Committee
25 October MMXVI
Page 21 of 87 Australian Mathematical Society Nominations and Publications Committee Report to Council 2016
This committee consists of: Secretary, P.J. Stacey; President-elect, K.A. Smith-Miles; A.L. Carey; J. Ramagge.
Publications work The Editor of the Bulletin has agreed to serve for a further three year term,
Nominations work In accord with its terms of reference, the committee supplemented the formal call in the Gazette for nominations to Council by an invitation to members to suggest Council subcommittees on which they were willing to serve. Both invitations were repeated in a general email to members. Two members had been nominated for Council by the closing date for nominations. The committee therefore sought a member from Tasmania to nominate for the re- maining position.
Other committees or o ces for which suitable members were found, their informal agreement obtained, and their names suggested to Council for consideration at the December 2016 meeting, include:
the Early Career Representative 2016-20; • the AustMS Medal Committee; • the George Szekeres Medal Committee; • the Gavin Brown Prize Committee; • the Mahler Lecturer Committee; • the Standing Committee on Mathematics Education; • the Fellowship Committee; • the Accreditation Committee; • the Student Conference Support Committee. •
P.J. Stacey (Secretary) October 2016
Page 22 of 87 Mahler Lectureship Committee report, November 2016
The Mahler Lectureship Committee currently consists of Wadim Zudilin (outgoing chair), Marcel Jackson (chair), Alex Ghitza (incoming chair), Vlad Gaitsgory (Vice President (conferences)) as well as one of the directors of the 2017 AustMS conference, Paul Smith.
As is already known, the full tour of the 2015 Mahler lecturer Manjul Bhargava did not proceed beyond the AustMS conference, and the committee is hoping that we are hoping to deliver a more complete set of lectures for 2017.
At this stage we do not have a clear choice of lecturer, though a number of names have been discussed, and the committee is gradually honing in on some targets. An issue at this point has been balancing the value of snaring an emerging superstar against the uncertainty that this holds; and finding someone who can vouch for the expository skills of the speaker. We are hopeful of making beginning discussions with a potential speaker in the near future.
Page 23 of 87 Report of the AustMS Fellowship Committee for the 2016 AGM
Starrred items
We have marked with a (*) items which we request the Council to discuss.
Committee members
Sid Morris (incoming chair), David Pask (chair) and Lesley Ward (outgoing chair).
Purpose of the Fellowship Committee
The AustMS Fellowship Committee is responsible for awarding the Society’s Lift-Off Fellowships and the annual Alf van der Poorten Travelling Fellowship. Council allocated funding of $35,000 per annum to fund up to seven Lift-Off Fellows per year for the 2013–17 financial years. The Alf van der Poorten Fellowships are funded by the family of the late Alf van der Poorten.
Student membership and application numbers for fellowships
We have just begun the seventh year of the Lift-Off Fellowships scheme. To date, two Lift-Off applications have been received for the 2016/17 financial year, no final decision has been reached on these applications so far.
Financial Year Applications Awarded 3 Year Average 2010/11 8 33,238.76 2011/12 9 24,160.00 2012/13 6 15,000.00 24,162.92 2013/14 4 19,600.00 19,586.67 2014/15 7 27,538.00 20,712.67 2015/16 16 52,674.00 33,270.67 Total 50 169,300.76
The Alf van der Poorten Travelling Fellowship is only available in odd-numbered years and so was not awarded in 2016. Committee Comments: A number of issues have arisen which we would like to bring to the attention of Council.
(a) (*) FUNDING: Towards the end of the 2015/16 financial year the Committee had a sudden influx of 5 high quality Lift-Off applications which, if funded as we would like, would take us well over the $35,000 per annum budget. We did not feel it fair to push these applications into the 2016/17 financial year as it would create the same problem later in the year. The Committee, in consultation with Peter Stacey agreed that, $35,000 per year should be awarded over a three-year rolling average. This allowed us to partly fund these 5 Lift-Off applications. Unfortunately, the rolling average formulation will limit the amount to be awarded in the financial year 2016/17 to $24,788. If the number of good applications continues at the rate of around 10 per year, the Committee will have to half-fund these applications on average. Hence, even with this minor tinkering, the current funding system for the Lift-Off scholarships may not be sustainable in the longer term (under the current conditions) and the Committee asks the AustMS Council to review the funding arrangements as soon as possible.
(b) APPLICATIONS: The Committee is generally very pleased with the high quality and increasing quantity of the Lift-Off applications it received in the financial year 2015/16. We believe that this indicates that the AustMS Lift-Off scholarship scheme has become a great success. We believe the sudden rise in number of applications for the 2015/16 financial year is at least partly due to our increased efforts to publicise the scheme, in particular the flyer we made in 2014/15 to advertise all five of the AustMS and ANZIAM scholarships, fellowships and travel awards (see attached copy of the PDF at the end of the report), and also publicity through WIMSIG’s newsletters, website and events.
(c) (*) FEEDBACK &RESUBMISSION: During the financial year 2015/16 an unsuccesssful applicant asked for feedback on their Lift-Off application, which they duly received from the Committee. The applicant then asked if they could resubmit an amended Lift-Off application. The Committee was divided on this issue, and we seek clarification from the AustMS Council for future reference.
Page 24 of 87 AUSTMS FELLOWSHIP COMMITTEE REPORT 2016
(d) (*) LIVING EXPENSES: Many Lift-Off applications are either solely for living expenses or the budget is topped up to $5,000 by an item for living expenses. This is fine and permitted, but nearly all applicants did not justify this budget item well: A time period (see below) for these expenses is often not mentioned and a justification for the amount requested is missing. Students who enquire about living expenses from the Committee are now told that a reasonable rate would be a pro rata version of the current standard (APA) PhD stipend should be used in the budget unless other factors come into play. In the future the Committee believes that there should be specific comment to this effect on the Lift-Off section of the AustMS website and ask the Council for approval.
(e) TIMELINE: As mentioned above very few Lift-Off applications give a timeline for the project, as none is requested. When the Committee asked successful applicants from the 2015/16 financial year for reports recently, two concerned applicants (marked below) wrote to indicate that they have made no progress on their projects to date (due to † teaching and other commitments). Both indicated that they still intend to complete their projects. The Committee will use its judgement on a case by case basis on how to deal with this.
Membership of the 2016-2017 Fellowship committee
In 2016-17, Sid Morris will chair the Fellowship Committee, David Pask moves to the position of outgoing chair and Lesley Ward leaves the committee. David and Sid would like to thank Lesley for her help and sound advice during our time on the Committee. The AustMS Council needs to appoint an incoming chair for 2016-17 (we believe that this is in progress). If there are gender balance issues in the future WIMSIG would be happy to be consulted, in particular to help develop lists of potential Committee members.
The 2015–16 Lift-Off Fellowships
In the financial year 2015/16 there were sixteen applications for the AustMS Lift-Off fellowships. One was rejected (see comment (c) above) and one was inelligible (not AustMS member). The following fourteen applicants were awarded Lift-Off fellowships.
Applicant University Awarded Ndii, Meksianis Newcastle 4,924 Chen, Chen Adelaide 4,000 Bourne, Chris Wollongong 4,800 Tam, Matthew Newcastle 3,700 Howie, Joshua Melbourne 5,000 Tronnolone, Hayden Adelaide 3,000 Amenta, Alex Australian National 2,250 Ladiges, Daniel Melbourne 5,000 Ham, Nicholas Tasmania 5,000 † Afzaly, Narjess Australian National 3,000 Tartaglia, Elena Melbourne 3,000 Phillip, Schrader Western Australia 3,000 † Ashish,Goyal New South Wales 3,000 Do, Thoan La Trobe 3,000 Total 52,674
COMMENTS: To see why two of the successful candidates have been marked see comment (e) above. Of the 14 funded † applicants, only two are female (Narjess and Tartaglia). At about 14%, this is a long way below the percentage of women among mathematical sciences PhDs awarded: 38% in 2014 according to the 2014 AMSI Survey. We need to continue efforts to increase the number of women applying for the Lift-Off Fellowship. (And for the Alf van der Poorten Fellowship–last time that was offered we had four applicants, all male.)
Fellowship Reports
1. DR CHEN CHEN Dr Chen Chen’s research is in the area of modelling with Differential Equations. In the first month of the fellowship, I looked at the two-periodic diffusion problem proposed by Bunder & Roberts. I extend the problem by assuming Dirichlet boundary conditions to replace the original periodic boundary conditions.
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Introducing the new boundary condition made the problem more complicated. I then modified the original published algorithm to accommodate the new boundary conditions. Then I compared and contrasted the simulation models given by both multiscale modelling methods. As the model was linear, I also compared the eigen spectrum of the macroscale models given by two methods. The difficulty I faced during comparing the eigen spectrum came from that most of the eigenvalues are complex and sorting complex eigenvalues in the best order is the a trivial task (sic). During this fellowship, I completed a manuscript titled “boundary conditions for macroscale waves in an elastic system with microscale heterogeneity”, which summarises my PhD research. I plan to submit this manuscript to an A-ranked journal. With the funding provided by AustMS, I also managed to participated in emac 2015. During the conference, I presented and exchanged my research ideas on multiscale modelling with other mathematicians in this field. I thankfully acknowledge the support of AustMS and the Lift-off Fellowship. It provided me a fantastic opportunity to broaden my knowledge in multiscale modelling.
2. DR DANIEL LADIGES Dr Daniel Ladiges research is in the area of Fluid Dynamics For my Australian Mathematical Society Lift-off Fellowship I was awarded $5,000 for use as a stipend while continuing work begun during my PhD. My principal goal during this period was to write a manuscript for publication, which covered and extended on work contained in the final chapter of my PhD thesis. The chapter describes a variational method for obtaining approximate solutions to the Boltzmann equation âA¸Sthis˘ approach is ideal for simulating nano-scale gas flows. When this work was almost complete we decided to split the material into two separate papers. The first has been finished and will shortly be submitted to Physical Review Fluids, the second is nearing completion. In addition to the above, we have commenced collaborations with several experimental groups, using the techniques developed during my PhD to help interpret the results of experiments involving micro- and nano-scale gas flows. This includes work modelling the flows in nano-scale squeeze film pressure sensors in order to understand the effects of gas rarefaction, and simulating the flow through hollow core optical fibres in order to characterise the boundary conditions. We have collected a large amount of data and made several findings regarding each of these systems, which should form the basis for several papers in the near future. Finally, I am developing a general implementation of Monte Carlo algorithms from my PhD thesis, allowing simulation of 2D nano-scale gas flows. The program emphasises ease of use, and will be made freely available to researchers investigating nano-mechanical systems operating in a gaseous medium. This work has been significantly advanced since the beginning of my fellowship, and an initial version should be completed within the next month. I am shortly commencing a post-doctoral position, during which I will be able to see each of these projects through to completion. The Lift-off Fellowship was invaluable in starting my academic career, and I with to thank the selection committee, and my supervisor Prof. John Sader.
3. DR ASHISH GOYAL Dr Ashish Goyal’s research concerns the Mathematical modeling of hepatitis B and hepatitis D viruses. Outcomes: (1) The possibility of the existence of cell-to-cell transmission in the spread of hepatitis B virus was proposed and investigated for the first time using computational modelling. This project has recently been accepted for publication under the title of “Modelling the Impact of Cell-to-cell Transmission in Hepatitis B Virus” in PLOS ONE. (2) The impact of ignoring HDV presence in the population on socio-economic outcomes of policies aimed at eliminating HBV prevalence was studied and this study has been accepted for publication as “Recognizing the impact of endemic hepatitis D virus on hepatitis B virus eradication” in Theoretical Population Biology. (3) During the period of the fellowship, a new collaboration with Dr. Harel Dahari from Loyola University was established. We are currently investigating how HCV cures after a short term of direct antiviral agents related drugs. (4) I have additionally initiated a project aimed at explaining the correlated dynamics of HBsAg and HDV RNA levels in HBV/HDV coinfected patients. The model has been developed and initial testing of the model to the real world data has been performed successfully. Future work: The research during this fellowship helped improve our understanding of hepatitis viruses and may lead to the development of a successful vaccine and/or therapy. The models proposed are novel and generic in nature that can be employed for the investigation of other viruses. This probably will be a profit to the scientific community as our research can be employed as a building tool in fields such as mathematical biology, epidemiology and public health policymaking. This fellowship will definitely improve my career opportunities in the future.
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4. DR CHRIS BOURNE Dr Chris Bourne’s work is in the area of of Mathematical Physics known as Noncommutative Geometry and Index Theory. Summary of Research. The purpose of the Fellowship was for funding to attend the workshop on “Refining C-algebraic invariants for dynamics using KK-theory”, that was held at the University of Melbourne, Creswick Campus on 18-29 July 2016. The Fellowship also funded a research visit to the University of Wollongong to work with A/Prof. Adam Rennie following the KK-theory workshop. During this period, I worked with A/Prof. Rennie on the problem of index theory of twisted crossed product C-algebras by Rd. Our motivation comes from continuous models of topological quantum systems in condensed matter physics, whose algebra of observables is a twisted crossed product acting on L2(Rd). In particular we studied the semifinite index theory of such algebras from the perspective of Kasparov theory. Expressions for the semifinite index pairing were derived and can be considered as the continuous analogue of the “noncommutative Chern numbers” studied by Prodan and Schulz-Baldes (3). We were able to generalise Prodan and Schulz-Baldes results as well as expand on earlier work of ours on the problem (1). We expect to finalise and submit these results for publication soon (2). References (1) C. Bourne, J. Kellendonk and A. Rennie. The K-theoretic bulk-edge correspondence for topological insulators. arXiv:1604.02337, 2016. (2) C. Bourne and A. Rennie. Chern numbers, localisation and the bulk-edge correspondence of continuous topological phases. To appear. (3) E. Prodan and H. Schulz-Baldes. Bulk and Boundary Invariants for Complex Topological Insulators: From K-Theory to Physics. Springer, Berlin, 2016.
5. DR JOSHUA HOWIE Dr Joshua Howie’s work is in the area of Topology, in particular Knot Theory. In my PhD thesis I introduced the class of weakly generalised alternating (WGA) links, and proved that they have essential checkerboard surfaces. I used the Lift-off fellowship to work with Jessica Purcell at Monash University to study the hyperbolic geometry of WGA links. We used the essential checkerboard surfaces to detect when a WGA diagram represents a hyperbolic, satellite, or torus link, including a complete classification for diagrams on the torus, a project begun in my thesis. For the hyperbolic WGA links, we were able to give criteria for when the checkerboard surfaces are accidental, virtually-fibred, or quasi-fuchsian. We also proved volume bounds on the complements of hyperbolic WGA links in terms of properties of a WGA diagram. I also used the fellowship to attend conferences in Europe in July. In particular, I presented my work at a low-dimensional topology summer school run by Central European University and Alfréd Rényi Institute in Budapest, Hungary, and at Knots in Hellas in Olympia, Greece.
6. DR HAYDEN TRONNLONE Dr Hayden Tronnlone’s research is in the area of Fluid Dynamics. Much of my thesis was devoted to the development of models for the stretching under gravity of fluid cylinders with internal air channels, leaving limited scope for a thorough comparison of the model with extruded preforms. Owing to this, I applied for an AustMS Lift-Off Fellowship that would provide financial support while I extended the brief analysis from my thesis into a thorough study of three representative preform designs, in each case comparing the behaviour observed in experiments with the predictions made by the model. This work showed that surface tension contributes significantly to deformation during preform extrusion and can explain some of the features observed in experiments; however, surface tension alone cannot explain all of the deformation. We concluded that surface tension and a second effect, extrudate swell, work in concert to deform the geometry once the fluid has left the die. In particular, extrudate swell may expand holes and reduce hole spacing, leading to a greater interaction between holes and hence greater surface-tension-driven deformation. The results of this investigation have been submitted for publication [1]. I would like to offer my thanks to AustMS and the Lift-Off Fellowship committee for providing me with the opportunity to continue this research. Through this Fellowship I not only received financial support between the completion of my PhD and the commencement of a postdoctoral position but was able to continue my work and identify avenues for future research and collaboration. I highly encourage all graduating PhD students to consider applying to this worthy scheme.
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References [1] Hayden Tronnolone, Yvonne M. Stokes, and Heike Ebendorff-Heidepriem. Extrusion of fluid cylinders of arbitrary shape with surface tension and gravity. Submitted, 2016.
7. DR ALEX AMENTA Dr Alex Amenta’s research is in the area of differential equations. During my Lift-off Fellowship, working with Pascal Auscher, I improved the results of my thesis on adapted Besov-Hardy-Sobolev spaces and boundary value problems and added some new ones, with the intention of eventually publishing them as a research monograph. We finally finished this in July 2016 (1). Recently, Chen, Coulhon, Feneuil, and Russ showed that for Vicsek manifolds (whose large-scale geometry resembles the global geometry of a Vicsek fractal) of any dimension, (R ) holds if and only if p 2. Their proof of p Lp-unboundedness of the Riesz transform for p>2 is quite simple, and during my Lift-off Fellowship I recognised that the combinatorial structure underlying this proof is that of a “spinal graph” (G, ⌃): an infinite graph G with a subset ⌃ V (G) such that G is a collection of finite graphs attached only along ⌃. For any spinal graph (G, ⌃) with ⇢ certain volume and dimension assumption–roughly speaking, ⌃ should be 1-dimensional, while G should have dimension greater than 1 (R ) fails for p>2 for all manifolds with geometry “close to” that of G. This gives a p mechanism for constructing manifolds which fail (Rp) for all p>2, and which need not have any fractal-like structure (unlike Vicsek manifolds). Following my Lift-off Fellowship I identified concrete examples of spinal graphs (G, ⌃) satisfying the relevant volume and dimension conditions: it is not obvious that many examples other the Vicsek graph exist, but indeed they do. However, the question of whether the associated manifolds satisfy (Rp) for 1
(1) A. Amenta and P. Auscher, Abstract Besov-Hardy-Sobolev spaces and elliptic boundary value problems with complex bounded measurable coefficients, arxiv:1607.03852, July 2016.
8. DR ELENA TARTAGLIA Dr Elena Tartaglia’s research is in the area Mathematical Physics We are interested in studying two-dimensional lattice models in statistical physics that satisfy the Yang-Baxter equation and are, therefore, exactly solvable. At criticality, these models exhibit universal behaviour that can be characterised by a corresponding conformal field theory. It is the aim of our research to study exactly solvable models and discover their corresponding conformal field theory. This AustMS Lift-off Scholarship has allowed me to conduct research further to my recent paper with collaborators Jean-Emile Bourgine and Paul A. Pearce titled “Logarithmic minimal models with Robin boundary conditions.” In this paper we applied Robin boundary conditions to the logarithmic minimal lattice models and showed that the conformal dimensions of the related conformal field theory, the logarithmic minimal models, has Kac label s taking half-integer values, instead of the standard integer values. The work during this scholarship began the search for boundary conditions corresponding to half- integer values for the other Kac label, r. We began by modifying parameters in the previous Robin boundary conditions, but this did not lead to the discovery of any new conformal dimensions. We are currently looking for a new solution to the boundary Yang-Baxter equation which gives conformal dimensions with half-integer Kac label r.
9. DR MATTHEW TAM Dr Matthew Tam’s research is in the area of optimisation. Stated abstractly, the feasibility problem asks for a point contained in the intersection of a finite family of constraint sets. Many fundamental problems arising in mathematics, science and engineering can be phrased in this language. For instance: systems of linear equations and inequations, imaging reconstruction (phase retrieval, ptychograpy), combinatorial optimisation (knapsack feasibility), and various matrix completion problems (correlation and distance matrix reconstruction). Iterative projection methods are class of general purpose algorithms which can be applied to these problems and remain popular due to their relative simplicity, easy-of-implementation, and experimentally observed good performance. These features are particularly appealing to the practitioner. Whilst there are a number of books which touch on the topic of projection methods, there exist few which are dedicated to their in-depth treatment and, those which do, offer little on current state-of-the-art. In this direction, two examples of recent progress in the area include the discovery the cyclic Douglas–Rachford method (1) and the use of regularity assumptions on the local geometry to analyse the methods in non-convex settings (2).
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I was fortunate enough to receive a Lift-off fellowship to fund a three week visit at the beginning of 2016 to the University of Alicante (Spain) where I was a visitor of Dr Francisco Aragón Artacho. During this visit, we commenced our ongoing preparation of a book, which we hope will provide an up-to-date account of projection methods covering aspects of both theory and applications. It is our hope that the book will be of interest to those working in optimisation theory as well as practitioners interested in using projection-type algorithms. I wish to thank the Lift-off fellowship for their generous support as well as Dr Aragón Artacho and the University of Alicante for their warm hospitality. References
(1) Borwein, J. M., & Tam, M. K. (2014). A cyclic Douglas–Rachford iteration scheme. Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications, 160, 1-29. (2) Lewis, A. S., Luke, D. R., & Malick, J. (2009). Local linear convergence for alternating and averaged nonconvex projections. Foundations of Computational Mathematics, 9, 485-513.
10. DR NARJESS AFZALY Dr Narjess Afzaly’s work is in the area of Graph Theory.
The focus of my PhD studies was on the efficient isomorph-free generation of different classes of graphs. Our results were considerably in excess of the previous results of the many people who worked on the same problems. I have been awarded a Lift-off Fellowship that facilitates my visit to Professor Brendan McKay at the Australian National University where I continue my research and prepare journal publications as follows:
Employing advanced generation algorithms, we have identified and catalogued the set of small Turán graphs for • collections of short cycles. Currently we are preparing 4 manuscripts based on these results. We have introduced a new method of canonical labeling and a modified version of the Orderly Generation based • on the new method. Our aim is to expand the application of this novel method to other classes of combinatorial objects such as Latin rectangles. During my PhD studies, in collaboration with C. Menon, we have developed an efficient algorithm to generate • 4-regular graphs. It is the most efficient known software for graphs up to 18 vertices. We are currently preparing a manuscript on this topic for publication.
Duties of the chair of the Fellowship Committee
For future reference, the duties of the chair of the committee include:
1. Ensure that all fellowship applications submitted to the council are considered within a reasonable time-frame. 2. Inform the applicants of the Lift-Off Fellowships of the decision of the committee. 3. Draft a letter for the chair of the society to send Ms Joy van der Poorten to tell her about the successful applicant for that years’ Alf van der Poorten travelling fellowship and to request that she transfer the funds to the society. 4. Maintain the Lift-Off and Alf van der Poorten fellows at the society’s pages at: www.austms.org.au/Lift-Off+Fellows • www.austms.org.au/Alf+van+der+Poorten+Fellows • In particular, add details of the successful fellow to the relevant fellowship pages. 5. Ensure that the Lift-Off Fellows submit a report on their Fellowship to the editors of the Gazette. 6. Draft a letter for the President of the Society to send to Joy van der Poorten to inform her of the Committee’s decision on the travelling scholarship. 7. Submit an annual report to the Council of the Society for inclusion in the reports for the at the AGM. The report should summarise all of the decisions made by the committee in the preceding year, together with any items for discussion by the Council. 8. Try to ensure that the Lift-Off and Alf van der Poorten Fellowships are widely advertised.
ATTACHMENT –AUSTMS FLYER – SEE OVER
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Supporting professional mathematicians in Australia, both pure & applied
Sup port for pos mathematics in Australiatgr aduat e
A027641
Support to Australian mathematicians for their caring responsibilities, while they travel for conferences or research visits
– Page 7 – Page 30 of 87 AUSTMS STUDENT SUPPORT SCHEME REPORT TO COUNCIL, AUGUST 2016 Summary In 2016, the student support scheme operated for the fourth year. This scheme is designed to partially fund students for presenting a paper at approved conferences. In 2016, there will be no Australian Mathematical Sciences Student Conference (AMSSC), so the only supported conference will be the annual meeting of AustMS. The advantages of SSS in terms of professional development, are generally well understood. These include broadening networks, gaining experience in public presentations and in applying for funding, including preparation of a budget. For this reason the rules of the scheme are interpreted quite strictly, with faulty applications penalised by reduced funding. Many students applied for full member’s registration, rather than reduced student’s registration. They were not penalised for this, as the reduced registration fee was apparent only after hitting the registration link on the main conference web page. SSS application deadline was set at two weeks before the (initial) conference's early bird deadline, and outcomes were provided around a week after the SSS deadline. This greatly helped a smooth registration process. This year, we had 36 applications from which 33 were partially funded, up to a maximum of 50% of actual expenses. Allocations of 40% actual costs were typical. These numbers are very close to last year’s. However accommodation costs seem to be rising. We used up all of AustMS allocation of $15,000. For 2017, we request a budget of $16,000 which will not necessarily be fully spent. The budget will also depend on whether there will be a sanctioned student conference. In that case, it is recommended that students who apply for support at both conferences be given lower priority for the second. One of the rejected applications did not include an abstract or personal case for support, one did not receive an endorsement from their supervisor or acting supervisor and one student applied from overseas, in
Page 31 of 87 the hope that after joining AustMS he would be given support for overseas travel. Part of the reply was that this would be contrary to the broad aims of AustMS in fostering mathematics in Australia. Nevertheless, it might be helpful if the AustMS had some policy on partial or zero support for overseas student applicants, for example Australians enrolled in overseas universities. The whole process was greatly helped by the AustMS online application system that had been developed by Jérôme Droniou. Although under the three-year rotation system, Jérôme will be the next member to depart, he has kindly offered to assist with the software, when needed. James Parkinson will be the next chair of SSS Committee. Some Issues While we noted some improvement, some applications did not respect the funding rules – in particular the limit of funding of half the total expenses. Supervisors should beware of clicking on “I support this application” without reviewing it and pin-pointing to their students possible mistakes they had made. When the scheme is in higher demand, we will need to be even stricter in defining acceptable applications. We include in an appendix to this report the wording that was used in 2015 on the AustMS annual meeting conference, and we suggest using a similar text in the years to come.