NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE OF MATHEMATICS AND ITS APPLICATIONS (NZIMA) ====== One of New Zealand's Centres of Research Excellence ====== Newsletter 15 May 2007 We're pleased to give you an update on news from the NZIMA. Right now we're waiting for the outcome of the re-selection round for Centres of Research Excellence. Our bid was accompanied by outstanding letters of support from university departments around the country and from professional associations in the mathematical sciences. We also received excellent referee reports, and our site visit on 20th March went very well (at least from our perspective). We are crossing our fingers for a good outcome. We heard the news a few weeks ago that the Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences (PIMS) in Canada has had its NSERC support renewed for a further five-year period, and increased by about 10%. Marston Conder and Vaughan Jones Co-Directors of the NZIMA SUMMARY OF CONTENTS 1. Workshop for Women in the Mathematical Sciences in NZ 2. Recent events 3. Awards and Honours 4. Profile: James Sneyd 5. Announcement of Maclaurin Fellows for 2008 6. NZIMA support for postgraduate research projects and other activities 7. Update on NZIMA programmes 8. Other News 9. Update on events calendar 1. WORKSHOP FOR WOMEN IN THE MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES IN NZ The NZIMA has initiated a workshop for Women in the Mathematical Sciences in NZ. This year's workshop is being organised by Dr Vivien Kirk (University of Auckland), for 5-7 November 2007. Vivien has just won additional sponsorship for this event from the Kate Edger Educational and Charitable Trust. Contact for details. 2. RECENT EVENTS Highly successful public lectures were given recently by our Visiting Maclaurin Fellow Marcus du Sautoy (on "The Music of the Primes", in Christchurch on 15th February and on 15th March in Auckland), and by Vaughan Jones (on "Why Flatland is a great place to do Algebra", in Wellington on 16th March). The Auckland lecture by Marcus du Sautoy was broadcast across the BestGRID/KAREN network to other NZ university sites, and was attended by over 350 people. It was advertised as the first of a possible series of joint activities with the Auckland Museum Institute (the Auckland branch of the Royal Society of NZ), and was followed up by another well-attended jointly-sponsored lecture, in the Museum's impressive new auditorium, by Charles Leedham-Green (on "Newton's Principia", on 4th April). A further public lecture will be given by Ian Stewart in October when he visits on a Seelye Fellowship from the University of Auckland. Marcus du Sautoy was also interviewed by Kim Hill on National Radio. 3. AWARDS AND HONOURS * NZIMA Co-Director Vaughan Jones is to be awarded the 2007 Prix Mondial Nessim Habif by the University of Geneva, for his achievements in mathematics. This is an annual prize awarded to prominent researchers from all disciplines. In 1990 Vaughan won a Fields Medal (widely regarded as equivalent to a Nobel Prize in Mathematics), and until last year was the only recipient of this award from the southern hemisphere. He was also the first winner of New Zealand's Rutherford Medal in 1991. He will be presented with the Prix Mondial Nessim Habif at a special ceremony at the University of Geneva in June. * Prof. Cheryl Praeger, a member of our International Scientific Advisory Board, has won one of 20 Federation Fellowships by the Australian Research Council. These fellowships, which are very generously funded, are highly prestigious awards designed to develop and retain highly skilled researchers within Australia and attract such researchers from overseas. * Prof. James Sneyd (University of Auckland) has been awarded a 2-year James Cook Fellowship in biological sciences by the Royal Society of NZ. These fellowships are awarded to "forward thinking" researchers who will make a significant contribution to New Zealand's knowledge base. See the next item for a profile of James Sneyd and his research. 4. PROFILE: JAMES SNEYD James Sneyd, one of the NZIMA's principal investigators, is Professor of Applied Mathematics (and Head of the Applied Maths Unit) at the University of Auckland. A University of Otago graduate, he gained his PhD at New York University in 1989, and has held positions also at UCLA, the University of Canterbury, the University of Michigan, and Massey University. He is best known for his work in physiological modelling, and was joint winner of the American Association of Publishers' Award in 1998 for Best New Title in Mathematics, for his book 'Mathematical Physiology' (co-authored with J. Keener). He is also closely involved with programmes at the Mathematical Biosciences Institute (in Ohio). James studies the dynamics of calcium in a variety of cell types, with particular focus on their role in airway smooth muscle contraction, the secretion of saliva, and the control of heart beat. With Vivien Kirk he has also recently begun studies of the role of canards in calcium oscillations. Over the next two years he will finish the second edition of his book, as well as begin major new projects on multi-level studies of asthma and of saliva secretion. In addition, he is developing new methods of constructing hybrid deterministic/stochastic models of calcium micro-domains, and how to connect them to whole-cell models. He also continues to work with New Zealand Steel, and Rakon Ltd, and his work has already resulted in improved methods of crystal oscillator production. 5. MACLAURIN FELLOWS FOR 2008 *Full-time Maclaurin Fellowship* Professor Eamonn O'Brien (University of Auckland) has been awarded a 12-month Maclaurin Fellowship beginning in the first half of 2008. Eamonn will undertake research in his specialist field of computational group theory - in which he is a world leader - concentrating on algorithms for computational recognition and analysis of linear groups (defined as matrix groups over finite fields) and the structure and classification of groups of prime-power order. *Visiting Maclaurin Fellowships* We have selected the following as future Visiting Maclaurin Fellows: - Professor Michael Eastwood (Adelaide), January 2008 & August 2008 - Professor Edgar Knobloch (UC Berkeley), July-September 2008 - Professor Jan Saxl (University of Cambridge), January 2008. 6. NZIMA SUPPORT FOR POSTGRADUATE RESEARCH PROJECTS & OTHER ACTIVITIES * Postgraduate Research * We have selected the following new postgraduate research students from NZ universities for merit-based scholarship support: - Blaise Drinkwater (VU Wellington), for a Masters project on randomness - Jonathan Crook (VU Wellington), for a PhD project on modelling sea-ice - Qizhi Zhou (U Waikato), for a PhD project on number theory - Joshua Koh (U Auckland), for a Masters project on flow in petroleum reservoirs - Michael Hayward (U Canterbury), for a Masters project on population estimation. * Conference & Visitors * The NZIMA will be supporting the following future events and activities: - NZ New Zealand Postgraduate Mathematics & Statistics Conference, Queenstown, October/November 2007 - First Joint Meeting of the American & NZ Math Societies, Wellington, December 2007 - Conference on Groups & Representations, Kaikoura, January 2008 - 4th International Conference on Combinatorial Mathematics & Combinatorial Computing, Auckland, December 2008 - Conference on Respiratory Modelling, Auckland, February 2008 - Conference on General linear methods for the numerical solution of ODEs, Auckland, July 2008 - Visit by Professor Ivan Shestakov (Sao Paulo), February 2008. 7. UPDATE ON NZIMA PROGRAMMES * Our Modelling invasive species programme (directed by Jennifer Brown, Alex James and David Wall at the University of Canterbury) has begun well, with a successful workshop at Hanmer Springs in April. This programme is involving positive interactions with the BioProtection CoRE, Landcare Research, AgResearch and Regional Councils, and additional sponsorship has been obtained by the programme organisers from the University of Canterbury, AgResearch, Landcare, and the Miss E.L. Hellaby Indigenous Grassland Research Trust. * Our programme on Partial Differential Equations held a successful meeting at Waitangi in January, and three projects have developed as the focus for research by the programme organisers (Colin Fox, Mike O'Sullivan and Boris Pavlov at the university of Auckland) and their students and postdoctoral fellow for the reminder of the programme, all involving industrial linkages: - Mid frequency sound transmission in lightweight timber framed structures - Modelling and inverse problems for geothermal model calibration - Sample based inference for electrical impedance tomography. A further workshop is being planned for August/September this year. * In December we circulated a questionnaire to ask directors of current and former programmes for feedback on the NZIMA's programme framework, including what worked well (or not so well) for them, and other matters. We got good responses, and the feedback was almost entirely positive. One clear thing the feedback shows is the continuing need for us to be as flexible as we can. Another concerns the challenge of expecting one of our programmes to run the customary NZMRI summer meeting in January. As a result of this, we are looking at ways in which we can support the summer meeting as more of 'summer school' (rather than an international conference/workshop), separately from NZIMA programmes. A decision on this will be dependent on the outcome of the CoRE selection round. 8. OTHER NEWS Dr Kathleen O'Hara (Associate Director of the MSRI) has agreed to join our International Scientific Advisory Board, as replacement for Hugo Rossi. We have appointed Judy Paterson as a schools liaison person for 2007, on a part-time basis (jointly with the University of Auckland's Mathematics Education Unit) to follow up on our MathsReach initiative - see http://www.mathsreach.org/ As President of the RSNZ Academy, Marston Conder presented Dr Catherine McCartin with her Hatherton award (as announced in the NZIMA's Newsletter last November) at Palmerston North in March. Research on the development of business skills by our Research Manager (Margaret Woolgrove) for her MBA was written up in the NZ Management magazine in March and featured in quite a large article in the 6th April issue of NZ Education Review. Margaret is expecting her second child in June/July, and she will take a period of about 7 months parental leave from the end of June. We are in the process of appointing a temporary replacement for Margaret. Marston Conder, Vaughan Jones and Graham Weir attended a Memorial Service (followed by a parliamentary reception) for the late Alan MacDiarmid, in Wellington on 16th March. 9. FORTHCOMING EVENTS IN THE MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES IN NZ & PACIFIC 26-29 June 2007, in Canberra (Australia): AMSI-sponsored Workshop on Symmetries and Stability See http://www.amsi.org.au/Symmetries.php/ 2-6 July 2007, at Hobart, Tasmania (Australia): Annual MERGA (Maths Education Research Group of Australasia) conference See http://www.aamt.edu.au/merga30/ 4-6 July 2007, at Christchurch: 2007 NZ Statistical Association Conference See http://www.math.canterbury.ac.nz/nzsa2007/ 8-14 July 2007, in Sydney (Australia): 18th International Conference on General Relativity & Gravitation (and 7th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves) See http://www.grg18.com/ 25-28 September 2007, in Auckland: NZ Association of Mathematics Teachers (NZAMT) 10th Biennial Conference See http://www.cce.auckland.ac.nz/conferences/index.cfm?S=CCE_NZAMTC 5-7 November 2007, at Long Bay, Auckland: Workshop for Women in the Mathematical Sciences in NZ Contact Dr Vivien Kirk for details 3-7 December 2007, in Dunedin: 32nd ACCMCC (Australasian Conference on Combinatorial Mathematics and Combinatorial Computing) See http://www.cs.otago.ac.nz/staffpriv/mike/ACCMCC32/32ACCMCC.html 12-15 December 2007, at Victoria University of Wellington, NZ: 1st Joint Meeting of the American and New Zealand Mathematical Societies See http://www.mcs.vuw.ac.nz/~mathmeet/amsnzms2007/ 13-17 July 2009, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia: First Pacific Rim Mathematical Congress See http://www.primath.org/ for updates SUBSCRIBING AND UNSUBSCRIBING Please forward this NZIMA newsletter to any non-subscriber to whom the material may be relevant and who may wish to receive the publication regularly. 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