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Fall 2013 Enrollment Information
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| Math used to cast light on how cells adapt to physical challenges |
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Assistant Professor Marcus Roper's goal is to apply mathematics to make new discoveries about how cells solve physical challenges. Those challenges and the solutions organisms have found for them have left deep imprints on how life has evolved. For instance, how and why did multicellular life arise?
"It's complex, beautiful and so dynamic," said Roper, in describing the dynamic movement of nuclei in the cells of a fungus. Having genetically different nuclei within a single cell benefits a fungus by making it more infectious, Roper said. However, this advantage only works if each part of the fungus contains a mixture of each type of genetically different nuclei. This is where the traffic-like flow comes in. As the cell's tubular filaments containing the nuclei grow, the flow process continuously distributes the different nuclei throughout the fungus cell, keeping them well mixed for maximum advantage.
The research, conducted with a group led by UC Berkeley life scientist Louise Glass and published July 16 in the early online edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, focused on the fungus Neurospora crassa. Fungus cells, unlike animal and plant cells, can contain more than one nucleus, and in N. crassa cells, multiple, genetically different nuclei coexist in the same cell space.
Roper has also been studying an organism in a family known as the choanoflagellates the closest single-celled cousins of multicellular animals. Scientists believe that something remarkable must have happened following the divergence of choanoflagellates from the multicellular animals to create conditions favoring complex multicellular life. Roper's recently published research uses fluid dynamics to shed light on the benefits for the choanoflagellates Salpingocea rosette - to form multicellular colonies.
See the whole story on UCLA Newsroom.
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| UCLA Math Student Receives the Elite 89 Award for 2013 |
Ryan Deeter
Junior Ryan Deeter was named the recipient of the Elite 89 award for the 2013 NCAA Division I Baseball Championship. The Elite 89 award is presented to the student-athlete with the highest cumulative GPA participating at the finals site for each of the NCAA's 89 championships.
Deeter, a Mathematics/Economics major, was named UCLA's Male Scholar Athlete of the Year last month. He is the first UCLA athlete in any sport to receive the Elite 89 award. Earlier this year, Deeter earned first-team Pac-12 All-Academic honors for the second year in a row, and received Capital One Academic All-District VIII accolades as well. On the field, Deeter has appeared in 21 games this season, all in relief, posting a record of 2-0 with a 4.24 ERA.
Eligible student-athletes for the Elite 89 award are sophomores or above who have participated in their sport for at least two years with their school. They must be an active member of the team, traveling and competing at the championship.
Read the story on UCLABRUINS.COM
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| Two Fellowships Received by UCLA Math Graduate Student |
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UCLA Mathematics graduate student, Hayden Schaeffer has been awarded both the National Science Foundation's Mathematical Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowship and the University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellowship in recognition of his research and contributions to education. Schaeffer has worked on imaging science and scientific computing projects with Professor Stanley Osher, Professor Luminita Vese, Professor Russel Caflisch and Professor John Garnett.
The National Science Foundation's Mathematical Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships supports future leaders in mathematics and statistics by facilitating their participation in postdoctoral research environments that will have maximal impact on their future scientific development.
The University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellowship supports new scholars interested in faculty careers who will contribute to diversity and equal opportunity in higher education through their teaching, research and service. The program is particularly interested in supporting scholars with the potential to bring to their academic careers the critical perspective that comes from their non-traditional educational background and understanding of experiences amongst groups historically underrepresented in higher education.
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| UCLA Math Postdoc Receives Chancellor's Award for Postdoctoral Research |
Craig Schroeder
Craig Schroeder was one of eight recipients (out of 23 nominees) of the 2013 UCLA Chancellor's Award for Postdoctoral Research. Schroeder, in collaboration with UCLA applied mathematics Professor Joseph Teran, was recognized for his significant contributions to the state of the art in numerical simulation of flexible solid bodies and incompressible fluids with applications to the computer graphics, computational engineering, and physics communities. Craig has published three papers during his first year and a half at UCLA; two of these are actively being used at Walt Disney Animation for the production of upcoming feature films. In addition to his research, Craig has successfully co-advised a number of Ph.D. students.
Since 1998, the UCLA Chancellor's Award for Postdoctoral Research has recognized the important contributions postdoctoral scholars make to UCLA's research mission all the while demonstrating the clear potential to have meaningful and enduring implications in their field. The nominated postdocs and pronounced recipients were honored during an Awards ceremony at the California NanoSystems Institute, which brought together scholars and faculty research mentors from a wide array of academic areas.
View the full list of nominees
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| Join Us For A Conference in Honor of James Ralston |
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Visit the Conference Website for details on:
- Registration
- Tentative schedule
- Accomodations
- Campus map
- Parking
- Dining
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| Sorin Popa elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences |
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The American Academy of Arts and Sciences has elected mathematics Professor Sorin Popa, along with 4 other UCLA faculty, into the 2013 list of Academy Fellows. Elected members stem from an array of disciplines including mathematics, science, public affairs, art, business, and scholarship. The Academy serves to honor these individuals' accomplishments while calling upon them to serve the public good by "conduct[ing] a varied program of projects and studies responsive to the needs and problems of society."
 Sorin PopaProfessor of mathematicsPopa, a fellow of the American Mathematical Society, is an expert in the branches of mathematics known as functional analysis/operator algebras and ergodic theory, among others. From 2000 to 2005, he elaborated a revolutionary new method for classifying operator algebras associated with actions of groups on measure spaces, which led to the solution of many mathematical problems that were believed to be unsolvable for several decades. Popa earned his doctorate from Romania's University of Bucharest and has been a mathematics professor at UCLA since 1987. He is the former chair of the UCLA math department and the recipient of numerous awards and honors. Read more from the UCLA Newsroom View the full list of 2013 fellows
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| Terence Tao honored by the Center for Excellence in Education |
 Terence Tao
Terence Tao, a professor of mathematics who holds the James and Carol Collins Chair in the UCLA College of Letters and Science, will be awarded the inaugural Joseph Lieberman Award for Outstanding Achievement in Mathematics from the Center for Excellence in Education (CEE), at its annual Congressional luncheon April 24 in Washington, D.C. The award honors Tao's significant contributions to mathematics and recognizes Senator Lieberman's more than 17 years of support of the center as a CEE Trustee. Read the full article from the UCLA Newsroom
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| Merkurjev Named Guggenheim Fellow |
Alexander Merkurjev
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UCLA Mathematics Professor Alexander Merkurjev has been named a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation for 2013 for his work on the Complexity of homogeneous spaces. 175 fellowships were awarded to a diverse group of scholars, artists, and scientists from an applicant pool of roughly 3,000 individuals. Fellows are appointed on their foundation of prior achievement and promising research. This marks the eighty-ninth annual competition for the United States and Canada. Read more on the Guggenheim Fellowship Awards View the list of 2013 Fellows in the United States and Canada here.
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| UCLA Places #3 in 2012 William Lowell Putnam Competition |
Back Row: Ufuk Kanat, Tudor Padurariu
Middle Row: Zhongnan Li, Professor Ciprian Manolescu
Front Row: Dillon Zhi, Francisc Bozgan, Man Cheung Tsui, Peihao Sun
UCLA's team placed 3rd out of 402 institutional teams in the 2012 William Lowell Putnam Mathematics Competition, surpassing last year's 12th place, and tied with its best-ever performance from 1968. The team was composed of UCLA undergraduates Xiangyi Huang, Tudor Padurariu, and Dillon Zhi, and was coached by UCLA Mathematics Professor Ciprian Manolescu. In the individual competition, Tudor Padurariu (#11 in the nation) and Xiangyi Huang (#18) will be awarded prizes from the Putnam Committee, and Francisc Bozgan will receive honorable mention. Other top-ranked scorers from UCLA were Derek Jung, Ufuk Kanat, Zhongnan Li, Cheng Mao, Peihao Sun, Man Cheung Tsui, Tianyi Zhang, Dillon Zhi. Twenty-nine UCLA undergraduates participated in the six-hour annual Putnam exam competition. The competition began in 1938 and is designed to stimulate a healthy rivalry in undergraduate mathematical studies across the U.S. and Canada.
View the UCLA Newsroom Article
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| NBC features UCLA Math in Science Behind the News Video |
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NBC Learn, in partnership with the National Science Foundation, launched
their latest set of stories in their series Science Behind the News.
The video collection explores science, technology, engineering
and math found in current events. Click here to view the video
featuring research in crime modeling conducted by UCLA Professors
Andrea Bertozzi (Math), Jeffrey Brantingham (Anthropology) and the
Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics.
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| Andrea Bertozzi named to UCLA's Betsy Wood Knapp Chair for Innovation and Creativity |
Andrea Bertozzi
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Andrea Bertozzi, a professor of mathematics and director of applied mathematics at UCLA, has been named the inaugural holder of UCLA's Betsy Wood Knapp Chair for Innovation and Creativity.
Under her leadership, UCLA's program in applied mathematics has become one of the premier programs in the United States and the world, said Joseph Rudnick, dean of the UCLA Division of Physical Sciences.
Bertozzi and her colleagues work with the Los Angeles Police Department to analyze crime patterns and predict crime hotspots, and they have designed a mathematical algorithm to identify street gangs involved in unsolved violent crimes. View the full UCLA Newsroom article.
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| UCLA Scientists Awarded $1 Million from the Keck Foundation |
Stanley Osher
Andrea Bertozzi
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UCLA Applied Math Professors Andrea Bertozzi and Stan Osher join an elite team of scientists as co-principal investigators for "Leveraging Sparsity" the UCLA project recently awarded the prestigious $1 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation.
Lead principal investigator Paul Weiss, director of UCLA's California NanoSystems Institute, and Mark Cohen, director of the National Institutes of Health-Funded UCLA Semel NeuroImaging Training Program, will work collaboratively with Bertozzi and Osher to revolutionize the field of sparse data collection and reconstruction across real world applications in areas such as science, medicine, and engineering. With the remarkable advances in pure and applied mathematics as the driving force behind the scientists' goal to "transform the way imaging and related data are acquired, analyzed and understood," the next two years will no doubt be an exciting time of innovation and discovery. View the full UCLA Newsroom article.
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| UCLA
Math Fall 2012 Newsletter Available Online |
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| Professor Stanley Osher Selected as The John von Neumann Lecturer |
Stanley Osher
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Professor Stanley Osher was selected as The John von Neumann Lecturer for the 2013 SIAM Annual Meeting. Established in 1959, this honor "is awarded every year to an individual for outstanding and distinguished contributions to the field of applied mathematical sciences and for the effective communication of these ideas to the community."
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In Memoriam: David G. Cantor
Professor of Mathematics, 1935 - 2012 |
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Professor Emeritus David G. Cantor passed away on November 19, 2012. After
completing undergraduate work at the California Institute of Technology in
1956, he received his PhD from UCLA in 1960 under the combined direction of
Basil Gordon and Ernst Straus. He held an instructorship at Princeton
University (1960-62), followed by an Assistant Professor position at the
University of Washington (1962-64). Professor Cantor came to UCLA in 1964
with an appointment in the Department of Mathematics and a courtesy
appointment in the Computer Science Department. Over the years he advised a
number of PhD students while also contributing greatly to the development of
computing capabilities in the Department of Mathematics. He retired from
UCLA in 1991 and thereafter was a researcher at the Center for
Communications Research in La Jolla, CA. His distinction in number theory
and combinatorics was recognized by a number of awards, including the
(honorary) NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in 1960 and a Sloan Foundation
Fellowship in 1968; and, most recently, by his selection as a Fellow of the
American Mathematical Society. At the time of his passing he was 77. He
will be greatly missed by all who knew him.
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| Professor Terence Tao Featured on Future Tense |
Terence Tao |
Professor Terence Tao was recently featured on Future Tense, an ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) program centered around exploring innovations induced by rapid change. The interview specifically highlighted the significance of digital technology and internet collaboration within the field of mathematics.
"Maths, it's everywhere! Whether it's the computer in our cars or the smartphone we use every day, maths plays an increasingly important role in our daily lives. But what impact are digital technologies themselves having on the way the process of maths works? And in a digital age do we need to change the way we teach maths to make it more relevant to our lives in the 21st century?"
Please click here to view the full episode.
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| Lloyd S. Shapley wins Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences |
Lloyd S. Shapley |
Our warmest congratulations to Lloyd Shapley, who today shared the 2012
Nobel Prize in Economics with Alvin Roth (Harvard)!
The citation reads that the prize was awarded "for the theory of stable
allocations and the practice of market design". Professor Shapley, in joint
work with David Gale (UC Berkeley, 1921-2008), provided the theoretical
fundamentals. Their 1962 paper "College admissions and stability of
marriage" explained how to match two groups of people (e.g., men and women
in the "marriage market") in a way that is stable. Professor Roth confirmed
the applicability of this theory through a series of laboratory experiments;
this has led to a number of applications. For example, the theory of
"market design" has been used in college admissions, allocations of new
doctors to medical schools, assignments of children to public schools, and
even in organ donation.
Professor Shapley joined UCLA in 1981, holding a joint position in the
economics and mathematics department. He has been professor emeritus since
2000. Click here for the UCLA Newsroom Report Click here to read more
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| UCLA Math #5 in the US |
UCLA Mathematics Department rose to the 5th place in the US and to the 9th place worldwide in the 2012 Shanghai rating of World Universities in Mathematics. This rise helped UCLA to climb to the 10th spot worldwide in the broader area of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. More information on the annual Shanghai rankings is available on the ARWU web site, http://www.shanghairanking.com/SubjectMathematics2012.html
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| AMS Interview with Professor Andrea Bertozzi: Forecasting Crime |
Andrea Bertozzi
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The American Mathematical Society recently interviewed UCLA Department of Mathematics Professor Andrea Bertozzi for a piece titled 'Forecasting Crime'. Here is some information and a link to the piece on the AMS website:
"No one can predict who will commit a crime but in some cities math is helping detect areas where crimes have the greatest chance of occurring. Police then increase patrols in these "hot spots" in order to prevent crime. This innovative practice, called predictive policing, is based on large amounts of data collected from previous crimes, but it involves more than just maps and push pins. Predictive policing identifies hot spots by using algorithms similar to those used to predict aftershocks after major earthquakes. Just as aftershocks are more likely near a recent earthquake's epicenter, so too are crimes, as criminals do indeed return to, or very close to, the scene of a crime."
Click here for the piece and audio podcast
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| UCLA Math Professors Named Simons Fellows and Simons Investigator |
Itay Neeman |
Sorin Popa |
Terence Tao |
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The Simons Foundation has awarded UCLA Mathematics Professors Itay Neeman and Sorin Popa 2012 Simons Fellowships in mathematics. The inaugural program supports academic leave for one year for distinguished scientists to facilitate significant advances in their research. In another inaugural program, the foundation selected Professor Terence Tao as one of seven Simons Investigators in mathematics. The new program provides a stable base of support for outstanding scientists, enabling them to undertake long-term study of fundamental questions. Founded in 1994 by Jim and Marilyn Simons, the Simons Foundation aims to advance the frontiers of research in mathematics and the basic sciences.
Click Here for more information about the Simons Fellows Program
Click Here for more about the Simons Investigators Program
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| Mark Green Serves as Vice Chair on Mathematical Sciences in the 21st Century Report |
The National Research Council released its preliminary report Fueling Innovation and Discovery: The Mathematical Sciences in the 21st Century in advance of its final study The Mathematical Sciences in 2025. The report committee, including its vice chair UCLA Math Professor Emeritus Mark Green, identifies recent advances in the mathematical sciences or advances enabled by mathematical sciences research. The report aims to show general readers how these advances are changing our understanding of the world, creating new technologies, and transforming industries. The National Research Council was organized by the National Academy of Sciences in 1916 to associate the broad community of science and technology with the Academy's purposes of furthering knowledge and advising the federal government.
Click here to read the report |
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| European Mathematical Society Prizes Awarded to Manolescu and Ioana |
Ciprian Manolescu |
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On July 2, UCLA Mathematics Professor Ciprian Manolescu and 2007 UCLA math PhD Adrian Ioana (PhD supervisor: Sorin Popa) were awarded European Mathematical Society prizes at the 6th European Congress of Mathematics in Krakow, Poland. The prize is awarded every four years at the congress to 10 outstanding young researchers who are 35 years old or younger. Manolescu was recognized for his deep and highly influential work on Floer theory, successfully combining techniques from gauge theory, symplectic geometry, algebraic topology, dynamical systems and algebraic geometry to study low-dimensional manifolds, and in particular for his key role in the development of combinatorial Floer theory. Ioana was cited for his impressive and deep work in the field of operator algebras and their connections to ergodic theory and group theory, and in particular for solving several important open problems in deformation and rigidity theory, among them a long standing conjecture of Connes concerning existence of von Neumann algebras with no outer automorphisms. Ioana is currently an assistant professor of mathematics at the University of California, San Diego.
Click Here for more information
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Adrian Ioana |
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| Conference Honors Professor Haruzo Hida's 60th Birthday |
Haruzo Hida |
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On June 18 – 23, the department will host a conference on p-adic Modular Forms and Arithmetic in celebration of UCLA Math Professor Haruzo Hida's 60th birthday. The international conference will bring together experts who will present current work on the connection between (p-adic) L-functions, Shimura varieties, and (p-adic) Galois representations.
Click Here for more information
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| Conference Honors Professor Emeritus Tony Chan's 60th Birthday |
Tony Chan |
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On June 8 – 10, the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM) at UCLA will host a three-day international conference on the Frontier of Computational and Applied Mathematics in celebration of UCLA Mathematics Professor Emeritus Tony Chan's 60th birthday. The themes of the conference will include fundamental theory and numerical analysis, numerics (stochastic methods, optimizations, and high performance computing), and applications in compressed sensing, imaging, optimal engineering design and networking.
Click Here for a conference schedule
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| UCLA Math Postdoc Receives Chancellor's Award for Postdoctoral Research |
David Uminsky |
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David Uminsky was one of six recipients of the 2012 UCLA Chancellor's Award for Postdoctoral Research. Of the approximately 1,093 UCLA postdoctoral scholars, 27 were nominated across disciplines in the basic and applied sciences, the professional schools, the social sciences and the humanities. Umnisky was recognized for his research in the mathematics of interacting particles in collaboration with UCLA applied mathematics Professor Andrea Bertozzi. This research area has applications in biology and the complex phenomena observed in locust swarms and bacterial colonies, as well as in engineering in many areas of cooperative control, including applications to robotic swarming. The award was established in 1998 to recognize the important contributions that postdoctoral scholars make to UCLA's research mission. Jérôme Darbon received the prize in 2009 for his research in image processing with Professor Stanley Osher.
Click Here for more information and a complete list of nominees and awardees
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| Professor Chandrashekhar Khare Elected to The Royal Society |
Chandrashekhar
Khare |
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UCLA Mathematics Professor Chandrashekhar Khare has been named among 44 new 2012 fellows and eight foreign members elected to the Fellowship of The Royal Society. The society cites Khare as an "extremely original mathematician studying the relationship between Galois representations and modular forms. His forte is finding ingenious but relatively simple new ideas." The Royal Society is a self-governing fellowship of many of the world's most distinguished scientists drawn from all areas of science, engineering, and medicine. Since its founding in 1660, the society's purpose has been to recognize, promote, and support excellence in science and to encourage the development and use of science for the benefit of humanity. Today there are approximately 1,500 fellows and foreign members, including more than 80 Nobel Laureates.
Click Here for more about Khare's election to The Royal Society
Click Here for a complete list of 2012 fellows
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| UCLA Math Professors Elected to American Academy of Arts & Sciences |
Russel Caflisch |
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UCLA Mathematics Professor Russel Caflisch and Professor Emeritus Thomas Liggett join 220 national and international scientists, scholars, writers, artists and other professionals who have been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences' 2012 class in recognition of preeminent contributions to their disciplines and to society at large. Caflisch and Liggett are two of six UCLA professors to be named new fellows this year. A leading center for independent policy research, the academy includes members who contribute to studies of science and technology policy, energy and global security, social policy and American institutions, the humanities and culture, and education.
Click Here for more information and a complete list of 2012 fellows
Click Here for more about the 2012 UCLA fellows
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Thomas Liggett |
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| UCLA Putnam Team Ranks Number Twelve in the U.S. and Canada |
Ciprian Manolescu with UCLA Putnam students Tudor Padurariu, Cheng Mao, Michael Burks, Bingfeng Lu, Daniel Montealegre and Francisc Bozgan
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In the December 2011 William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition the UCLA team ranked 12th out of 460 institutional teams. A total of 4,440 students from 572 colleges and universities in the U.S. and Canada participated in the competition. UCLA's three-member team included undergraduate mathematics students Francisc Bozgan, Cheng Mao and Tudor Padurariu. UCLA Mathematics Associate Professor Ciprian Manolescu led the UCLA team to its best ranking since 1970. Padurariu (43 points, ranked 40 overall) and Mao (35 points, ranked 78 overall) received Honorable Mentions for their individual scores. Other high ranking UCLA students included Michael Burks (30 points, ranked 142 overall), Daniel Montealegre (21 points, ranked 276 overall) and Bingfeng Lu (20 points, ranked 316 overall). Twenty-five UCLA students participated in the competition. The six-hour annual Putnam exam competition began in 1938 and is designed to stimulate a healthy rivalry in undergraduate mathematical studies across the U.S. and Canada.
Click Here for more information on UCLA Putnam activities
Click Here for more about the UCLA Putnam team
Click Here for more 2011 William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition results
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| Conference Honors Professor Stanley Osher's 70th Birthday |
Stanley Osher |
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On April 4 – 6, the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM) at UCLA will host a three-day conference on Advances in Scientific Computing, Imaging Science and Optimization in celebration of UCLA Math Professor Stanley Osher's 70th birthday and his mathematical contributions to high resolution shock capturing schemes, the level set method, applications to multi-phase flows, computer vision, TV (total variation) based image restoration and optimization. This forward looking conference will cover recent progress and new directions in several important aspects of scientific computing, imaging science and optimization.
Click Here for a conference schedule
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In memoriam: Basil Gordon
Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus, 1931 – 2012 |
Basil Gordon |
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Basil Gordon was born on December 23, 1931, and died 80 years later on January 12, 2012. He grew up in Baltimore and attended Johns Hopkins University where he received his master's degree in mathematics in 1953. While still an undergraduate, he spent a year in Hamburg, studying with the great algebraists Emil Artin and Ernst Witt. He had studied German and was fluent in it, an asset that also served him well later. In 1956, he received his PhD from Caltech under the supervision of the number theorist Tom Apostol. Gordon's thesis on Tauberian Theorems in number theory set him on a course of continuing contributions to the field for the rest of his life, the latest being work with his former student Richard MacIntosh completed just last year. Gordon spent one year as a postdoctoral fellow teaching at Caltech and then was offered a position at UCLA, where he looked forward to working with Ernst Straus and Ted Motzkin to whom he attributed a great part of the department's attraction for him.
Read More...
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| Sebastien Roch and Marcus Roper Awarded Sloan Research Fellowships |
Sebastien Roch |
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The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation has awarded UCLA Mathematics Assistant Professors Sebastien Roch and Marcus Roper 2012 Sloan Research Fellowships in mathematics. Established in 1955, the two-year fellowships are given to early career scientists and scholars whose achievements and potential identify them as the next generation of scientific leaders.
Read more...
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Marcus Roper |
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| Crafoord Prize in Mathematics Awarded to Terence Tao |
Terence Tao |
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The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has awarded the Crafoord Prize in Mathematics 2012 to UCLA Mathematics Professor Terence Tao. Tao shares the award with Jean Bourgain (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton). The laureates are cited "for their brilliant and groundbreaking work in harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, ergodic theory, number theory, combinatorics, functional analysis and theoretical computer science." Their contributions to the fundamental results in the field of mathematical analysis, on their own and jointly with others, are recognized in particular. Established in 1982, the rotating prize promotes international basic research in the disciplines of astronomy and mathematics, biosciences, geosciences and polyarthritis to complement those fields for which the Nobel Prizes are awarded.
Click Here for more information
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| Alexander Merkurjev Awarded AMS Cole Prize in Algebra |
Alexander Merkurjev |
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UCLA Mathematics Professor Alexander Merkurjev has been awarded the 2012 Frank Nelson Cole Prize in Algebra by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) for his work on the essential dimension of groups. The essential dimension of a finite or of an algebraic group G is the smallest number of parameters needed to describe G-actions. For instance, if G is the symmetric group on n letters, this invariant counts the number of parameters needed to specify a field extension of degree n, which is the algebraic form of Hilbert's 13th problem. The prize citation notes that "Merkurjev's unique style combines strength, depth, clarity, and elegance, and his ideas have had broad influence on algebraists over the last three decades." The prize was founded in 1928 in honor of Professor Cole and is currently awarded every three years for outstanding contributions to algebra.
Click Here for more information
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| Mark Green Elected as 2011 Fellow by AAAS |
Mark Green |
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In November, UCLA Mathematics Professor Emeritus Mark Green was named fellow by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world's largest general scientific society and the publisher of the journal Science. Green was among five UCLA scholars to be selected this year. Members are chosen for their distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications. Green was honored for "outstanding research in several complex variables, commutative algebra, Hodge theory, and algebraic geometry, and for co-founding the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics," a national research institute funded by the National Science Foundation that fosters interdisciplinary collaboration among mathematical scientists and physical scientists, engineers, biologists, medical researchers, and researchers in the humanities and social sciences. The selection of fellows has been an AAAS tradition since 1874.
Click Here for more information about the UCLA fellows
Click Here for complete list of new fellows
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| UCLA
Math Fall 2011 Newsletter Available Online |
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| UCLA Mathematicians Solve Violent Los Angeles Gang Crime with Math |
Hollenbeck gangs network |
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On October 31, 2011, the Los Angeles Times featured new research by UCLA mathematicians that uses a mathematical algorithm to identify street gangs involved in unsolved violent crimes. Professor Andrea Bertozzi, Assistant Adjunct Professor Martin Short and PhD student Alexey Stomakhin set out to solve the problem proposed by the Los Angeles Police Department to identify the top three most likely gangs responsible for an unsolved crime based on activity patterns in the field data of the Hollenbeck division in East Los Angeles, home to some 30 gangs and nearly 70 gang rivalries. Building on the earthquake model they had previously developed to analyze crime activity between these gangs, the research team set out to solve the inverse problem of identifying which gang might be responsible for the unsolved crimes. The results are promising. About 80 percent of the time, the algorithm places the true culprit in the top three gangs based on simulated data that mimics the field data. The result would be approximately 50 percent of the time with random guessing. The algorithm has the potential to apply to a broader class of problems that involve activity on a social network, including identifying terrorist groups based on their communications activity.
Click here to read about their research in the Los Angeles Times
Click here to read about their research in the UCLA Newsroom
Click here to read their research article in the mathematical journal Inverse Problems
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| UCLA Math Alumnus Richard Tapia Receives National Medal of Science |
Richard Tapia |
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UCLA Mathematics alumnus Richard A. Tapia (BA, 1961, MA 1966, PhD 1967) was named among seven outstanding researchers as a 2011 recipient of the National Medal of Science, the highest honor bestowed by the United States government on scientists and engineers. Tapia was cited for his "pioneering and fundamental contributions in optimization theory and numerical analysis and for his dedication and sustained efforts in fostering diversity and excellence in mathematics and science education." Tapia is a professor of engineering, computing and applied mathematics at Rice University, where he joined the faculty in 1970.
Click Here for a full list of recipients
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In memoriam: Jonathan Rogawski
Professor of Mathematics, 1955 – 2011 |
Jonathan Rogawski |
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Professor Jonathan Rogawski passed away on September 27, 2011, after a long battle with cancer. Rogawski was a key figure in the dynamic and central field of automorphic forms. He was 56 and had been ill for nearly a decade.
Rogawski was raised in the Brentwood district of Los Angeles and attended the Palisades public high school. He began his higher education at Yale University from which he received simultaneous BS and MS degrees in 1976. He did his PhD research at Princeton University and received his mathematics PhD in 1980 from that school. His thesis advisor was Robert P. Langlands, author of the visionary Langlands Program which asserts the existence of remarkable connections between the fields of infinite dimensional representation theory, algebraic geometry, number theory and automorphic forms. After his PhD, Rogawski held positions at the SFB at the University of Bonn (1980 – 1981), Yale University (1981 – 1983), the Institute for Advanced Study (1983 – 1984), and the University of Chicago (1984 – 1986). He came to UCLA as associate professor in 1986 and advanced to full professor in 1989.
Read More...
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| Joseph Teran Wins
Presidential Early Career Award |
Joseph
Teran |
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UCLA Mathematics
Associate Professor Joseph Teran has been
named by President Barack Obama among 94
recipients of the Presidential Early
Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers
(PECASE), the highest honor bestowed by
the United States government on science
and engineering professionals in the early
stages of their research careers. Sixteen
federal departments and agencies join
together annually to nominate the most
outstanding scientists and engineers whose
early accomplishments show the greatest
promise for assuring America’s preeminence
in science and engineering, and
contributing to the missions of the
agencies. Teran was one of three UCLA
scientists to receive the PECASE. His
research interests include computational
biomechanics and virtual surgery. As a
pioneer of virtual surgery, Teran uses
mathematics — including computational
geometry, partial differential equations
and many-core computing — to enable
surgeons to practice on a
three-dimensional “digital double” of a
patient before performing an actual
surgery. His applied math can also be used
to design more durable bridges, freeways,
cars and aircraft.
Click
Here to learn more about Teran’s
research
Click
Here for a full list of PECASE
recipients |
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| UCLA
Math Crime Modeling Research Helps Fight
Crime in California |
In California the
Santa Cruz Police Department has adopted a
new program in predictive policing that
uses sophisticated mathematical modeling
developed by a UCLA research team led by
UCLA Mathematics. In the same way that
earthquake models predict aftershocks, the
model predicts "hotspots" where future
crimes, such as burglaries and car thefts,
are likely to occur. In Santa Cruz, law
enforcement deployed patrols to targeted
crime hotspots, which resulted in a 27
percent drop burglaries in one area
compared to the same month a year ago.
Other cities including Boston, Chicago and
Los Angeles are considering adopting
predictive policing as law enforcement
agencies contend with scarce resources and
budget cuts. The academic research team
includes UCLA Math Assistant Adjunct
Professor Martin Short, former UCLA Math
postdoc George Mohler (Santa Clara
University), UCLA anthropologist Jeffrey
Brantingham, UCLA Statistics Associate
Professor Rick Paik Schoenberg and UC
Irvine criminologist George Tita.
Click
Here to watch the August 20, 2011, NBC
Nightly News piece with Martin Short
Click
Here to read about crime modeling in The
New York Times on August 15, 2011 |
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| UCLA
Math Receives Major NSF Research Training
Group Grant in Logic |
The departments of
mathematics at UCLA, UC Irvine and Caltech
were jointly awarded a major Research
Training Group (RTG) grant in mathematical
logic by the National Science Foundation.
UCLA Mathematics will receive $1.1 million
of the $2 million grant over five years.
As part of the NSF initiative to enhance
the mathematical sciences workforce in the
21st century, the grant will fund numerous
programs including summer schools for
undergraduate and graduate students;
graduate and postdoctoral fellowships;
community college, high school, and middle
school enrichment programs; and other
initiatives designed to improve training
and increase the visibility of
mathematical logic and mathematics as a
whole. UCLA Mathematics Professor Itay
Neeman directs the project along with
co-principal investigators Matthew Foreman
at UC Irvine and Alexander Kechris at
Caltech.
Click
Here for more information |
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|
In memoriam: Barrett
O'Neill
Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus, 1924 –
2011 |
Barrett
O'Neill |
|
|
Professor Emeritus
Barrett O'Neill died on June 16, 2011, at
age 87. O'Neill joined the department in
1951, directly from MIT, where he had just
received his PhD under the direction of
Witold Hurewicz. O'Neill retired in 1991,
but he continued his mathematical work,
with a major book on relativity, The
Geometry of Kerr Black Holes,
published in 1995. O'Neill began his
mathematical life as an algebraic
topologist: his dissertation was on fixed
point theory and he made further
contributions to that subject, developing
a generalization of the Lefschetz Fixed
Point Theorem to multi-valued (set-valued)
mappings. But quite early on, he turned
primarily to Riemannian geometry and to
semi-Riemannian geometry, the geometry of
non-degenerate quadratic forms on the
tangent spaces that are not positive
definite.
Read
More... |
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| UCLA
Applied Math Research Paper Recognized as
One of Most-Cited |
“The Split Bregman
Method for L1-Regularized Problems” (SIAM
J. Imaging Sci. 2[2]: 323-43, 2009)
authored by UCLA Math Professor Stanley
Osher and then PhD student Tom Goldstein
has been identified by Thomson Reuters Essential
Science IndicatorsSM as
a featured New Hot Paper in the field of
computer science. The distinction has been
given to the research article as one of
the most-cited papers in this discipline
published during the past two years. The
class of L1-regularized optimization
problems has received much attention
because of the introduction of “compressed
sensing,” which allows images and signals
to be reconstructed from small amounts of
data. Osher and Goldstein show that the
Bregman iteration can be used to solve
rapidly and accurately a wide variety of
constrained optimization problems, such as
image denoising and a compressed sensing
problem that arises in magnetic resonance
imaging and elsewhere.
Click
Here to read the abstract and download
the full paper
Click
Here to read an interview with Goldstein
and Osher about the paper |
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|
In memoriam: Herbert
B. Enderton
Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus, 1936 –
2010 |
Herb
Enderton |
|
|
Adjunct Professor
Emeritus Herbert B. Enderton died at his
home in Santa Monica on October 22, 2010,
after battling leukemia for nearly a year.
Enderton received his PhD in mathematics
in 1962 at Harvard University under the
supervision of Hilary Putnam. He had a
postdoctoral appointment at MIT from 1962
to 1964, and he was an assistant professor
at UC Berkeley from 1964 to 1968. In 1968
he came to UCLA, where he took on two
half-time positions, one in the
mathematics department and the other as an
editor of the reviews section of the Journal
of Symbolic Logic. In 1980 the
latter job became a more important one
when he was made the coordinating editor
of the reviews section. As such he was in
charge of a major function of the
Association for Symbolic Logic, and he
remained in this role until 2002. Enderton
retired from department in 2003, but he
continued to teach regularly until he
became ill in 2009. He similarly continued
being in charge of the UCLA Logic
Colloquium, as he had been for decades.
Read
More... |
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| NSF
Awards $2 Million for UCLA Applied Math
Research Training Program |
2010 Applied Math REU Group
|
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|
The department's
"California Research Training Program in
Computational and Applied Mathematics"
proposal to the National Science
Foundation (NSF) was ranked at the top of
35 mathematical sciences workforce
proposals and funded at the level of $2
million over five years. UCLA applied math
professor Andrea Bertozzi leads the
program with fellow applied math faculty
Stanley Osher, Luminita Vese and Joseph
Teran to engage California math
undergraduates and master's students in
summer research on topics such as crime
modeling, fluid dynamics experiments and
modeling, robotics and control, medical
imaging, cancer stem cells, bone growth,
remote sensing applications, alcohol
biosensors, photovoltaic cells, and
algorithm design for microscopy. The
program, which is a state-wide expansion
of the department's successful applied
math summer research program, involves
cross-disciplinary collaboration with UCLA
and partnering California university
faculty in medicine, anthropology,
engineering, chemistry, and other fields.
The new award also includes a training
program for postdocs and junior faculty to
learn how to involve pre-PhD students in
publication-level research, and supports
training of some PhD students in both
research and mentoring.
Click
Here for more information on the
Training Program Grant... |
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|
| In memoriam: Greg
Hjorth, Professor of Mathematics, 1963 –
2011 |
Greg
Hjorth |
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|
Professor Greg Hjorth
died of a heart attack in his birth city
of Melbourne, Australia, on Jan. 13. He
was 47. Hjorth was recognized as a young
chess whiz in his primary school years. He
quickly advanced to tournament chess,
becoming joint Commonwealth Champion in
1983 and earning his International Master
title in 1984. He played Garry Kasparov,
among other accomplished chess rivals, but
took his own later advice that "if you're
not in the top 100 by 21, get out."
Hjorth's passion for chess played over to
mathematical logic, a field that saw him
reach great heights with high academic
honors and wide recognition. After
receiving his undergraduate degree in
mathematics and philosophy at the
University of Melbourne, Hjorth continued
his studies at UC Berkeley, where he
received his PhD in mathematics under the
supervision of Hugh Woodin in 1993. As a
graduate student, Hjorth was recognized
for his exceptional talent, and his
brilliant thesis was awarded the first
Sacks Prize in 1994 by the Association for
Symbolic Logic for his research in
descriptive set theory and its surprising
consequences concerning the relationship
between projective sets and large
cardinals. Hjorth pursued his postdoctoral
studies at Caltech for two years then
joined the mathematics faculty at UCLA in
1995, where he was made full professor in
2001. Since 2006, he spent two quarters of
each year at the University of Melbourne
appointed to a prestigious Australian
Research Council professorial fellowship.
Read
More... |
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| AMS Cole Prize in
Number Theory Awarded to Chandrashekhar
Khare |
Chandrashekhar
Khare |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Chandrashekhar Khare and his
collaborator Jean-Pierre Wintenberger were
awarded the 2011 Frank Nelson Cole Prize
in Number Theory by the American
Mathematical Society (AMS) for their
remarkable proof of Serre's modularity
conjecture. The conjecture was first
proposed in 1973 by Fields Medalist
Jean-Pierre Serre and has had an important
impact in number theory. In the mid-1980s,
Gerhard Frey and Serre realized that the
conjecture implies Fermat's Last Theorem,
the landmark problem that was solved by
Andrew Wiles in the 1990s. Wiles used
ideas relating to Serre's conjecture to
prove the theorem, but at that time the
conjecture seemed out of reach. In 2004
Khare and Wintenberger astonished the
mathematical community when they found an
extremely beautiful strategy to attack
Serre's conjecture. The Cole prize was
founded in 1931 in honor of Professor
Cole. It is the most eminent prize in
number theory and is awarded every three
years. |
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| UCLA Math Crime
Research Makes Best Ideas and Stories of
2010 |
L.A.
area crime hot spots |
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|
UCLA Mathematics
collaborative research that uses
sophisticated mathematics in predictive
policing made The New York Times
Magazine 10th Annual Year in
Ideas and DISCOVER Magazine
Top 100 Stories of 2010. Two different
models were developed by UCLA
mathematicians and statisticians in
conjunction with anthropologists and
criminologists. Work by former UCLA Math
postdoc George Mohler (Santa Clara
University), UCLA Math Assistant Adjunct
Professor Martin Short, UCLA
anthropologist Jeffrey Brantingham, UCLA
Statistics Associate Professor Frederic
Schoenberg and criminologist George Tita
(UC Irvine) on self-exciting point process
models was included in The Times'
selection of ingenuity and innovation.
Joint work by UCLA Math Professor Andrea
Bertozzi, Short and Brantingham that
applies bifurcation theory to crime hot
spot models was number 60 (Fighting Crime
with Mathematics) on the DISCOVER
top stories list.
Click
Here for more at the New York Times
Magazine
Click
Here for more at DISCOVER Magazine |
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|
In memoriam:
Lowell J. Paige, Professor of Mathematics,
Emeritus, 1919 – 2010 |
Lowell
J. Paige |
|
|
Professor Emeritus
Lowell J. Paige died on his birthday in
Carmichael, Calif., on Dec. 10. He was 91.
Paige served as a lieutenant in the U.S.
Naval Reserve during World War II from
1942 to 1946. He received his PhD in
mathematics in 1947 at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison under the supervision of
Richard Hubert Bruck. Paige’s research
interest was abstract algebra. In 1947
Paige joined the faculty of the UCLA
mathematics department, where he served as
chair from 1964 to 1968. At that time, the
Mathematical Sciences Building was being
built. Paige added the 5th floor
Mathematics Department Reading Room to the
building plans and rescued the book
collection from the old Institute for
Numerical Analysis to establish the
reading room. Paige launched his
university leadership career with his
election as vice-chairman of the Academic
Senate in 1966, then chairman in 1968.
Read
More... |
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| UCLA
Math Fall 2010 Newsletter Available Online |
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| Chandrashekhar Khare
Awarded Infosys Prize 2010 |
Chandrashekhar
Khare |
|
|
The Infosys Science
Foundation named UCLA Mathematics
Professor Chandrashekhar Khare the winner
of the Infosys Prize 2010 in mathematical
sciences. The prize recognizes outstanding
contributions to scientific research that
have impacted India across five
categories: mathematical sciences,
physical sciences, engineering and
computer science, life sciences and social
sciences. Established in February 2009,
the annual prize is one of the largest in
terms of prize money for any such honor in
India and seeks to elevate the prestige of
scientific research in India and to
inspire young Indians to pursue a career
in scientific research. The award ceremony
will be held on January 6, 2011 in Mumbai,
where Dr. Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister
of India will present the awards to the
winners.
Click
Here for more information... |
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| Conference to Honor
Professor Don Blasius' 60th Birthday |
Don
Blasius |
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|
On November 11 - 12,
the department will host a two-day
conference on Motives and Modular Forms in
celebration of UCLA Math Professor Don
Blasius' 60th birthday and his
mathematical contributions. Themes will
include modular forms, motives, Galois
representations, and L-functions.
Click
Here for more information about speakers
and registration... |
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|
| Pólya Prize
Awarded to Terence Tao |
Terence
Tao |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Terence Tao (with Emmanuel
Candès, Stanford) has been named
the recipient of the 2010 George
Pólya Prize by the Society for
Industrial and Applied Mathematics. The
award recognizes Tao’s role in developing
the theory of compressed sensing and
matrix completion, which enables efficient
reconstruction of sparse, high-dimensional
data based on very few measurements.
According to the selection committee, the
algorithms and analysis are not only
beautiful mathematics, worthy of study for
their own sake, but they also lead to
remarkable solutions of practical
engineering problems. The prize has been
given every two years since 1969 in honor
of George Pólya. UCLA Mathematics
Professor Emeritus Alfred Hales and
Professor Bruce Rothschild received the
prize in 1971.
Click
Here for more information... |
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| IPAM to Celebrate NSF
Renewal with 10th Anniversary Conference |
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|
The NSF Division of
Mathematical Sciences has recommended the
Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics
at UCLA for a five-year renewal with a
substantially increased budget. Founded to
create visionary, interdisciplinary
collaboration between mathematicians and
researchers from biology, medicine,
engineering, and other disciplines, IPAM
will celebrate its continued NSF support
with a 10th anniversary workshop and two
public lectures on November 2 - 4, 2010.
Click
Here for registration and information...
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| Curtis Center to Help
Craft Content Standards for California
K-12 Math Education |
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|
The Department of
Mathematics' Curtis Center for Mathematics
and Teaching Executive Director Heather
Calahan has been appointed to the
California Academic Content Standards
Commission by state assembly speaker John
Pérez. The commission is comprised
of 21 appointees and is charged with
developing and presenting to the state
board of education, new content standards
in language arts and mathematics, a
majority of which will conform to national
common core standards recently created by
an interstate collaborative led by the
National Governors Association and the
Council of Chief State School Officers. In
addition to being one of the top-ranked
mathematics research institutions in the
nation, UCLA Math is involved in programs
promoting high quality pre-collegiate
mathematics education for California
students.
Click
Here for more information about the
commission...
Click
Here for more information on the work of
the UCLA Math Curtis Center... |
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| Christoph Thiele
Receives Humboldt Research Award |
Christoph
Thiele |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Christoph Thiele is the
recipient of a prestigious Humboldt
Research Award granted in 2009 across
scientific disciplines. The Humboldt
Research Award honors a scholar’s
scientific work to date, which is
recognized as having significant impact on
the scholar’s discipline. Named after
Prussian scientist and explorer Alexander
von Humboldt, the Humboldt Foundation
promotes academic cooperation between
exceptional scientists and scholars from
Germany and abroad. Thiele works in
harmonic analysis and is a leading expert
on modulation invariant singular integral
theory. He will use the award to support a
research year at the University of Bonn in
Germany.
Click
Here for more information... |
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| UCLA
Math Hosts International Workshop on
Arithmetic Geometry |
On June 14 – 20, the
department’s top-ranked number theory
group will host an instructional workshop
on the study of L-functions and Galois
representations, which are at the heart of
modern research in number theory and
arithmetic geometry. In the most recent
U.S. News & World Report graduate
school rankings, the UCLA Math
Algebra/Number Theory/Algebraic Geometry
research group was rated number nine in
the nation.
Click
Here for more information about speakers
and registration... |
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| NSF
Awards Two Focus Research Grants to UCLA
Math |
In April, the UCLA
Department of Mathematics was awarded two
major Focus Research Group (FRG) grants
from the National Science Foundation in
both pure and applied mathematics. In pure
mathematics, Associate Professor Christian
Haesemeyer (with co-principal
investigators Eric Friedlander and Aravind
Asok at USC; Mark Walker at University of
Nebraska; and Chuck Weibel at Rutgers
University) will conduct collaborative
research to study classical questions in
algebraic geometry using invariants of
algebraic varieties arising from homotopy
theory. Applied math Professor Andrea
Bertozzi leads research on the mathematics
of large scale urban crime, along with
Professor Lincoln Chayes, Assistant
Adjunct Professors Martin Short and George
Mohler, as well as UCLA anthropologist
Jeffrey Brantingham and George Tita (UC
Irvine).
Click
Here for more information on the
algebraic geometry FRG...
Click
Here for more information on the crime
FRG... |
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|
| UCLA
Math Rises in National and World Rankings |
  In April, U.S. News
& World Report released its 2010 Best
Graduate Schools rankings, propelling the
UCLA Department of Mathematics to its
highest historical ranking of number eight
(shared) overall in the country. In five
of seven research specialties, the
department ranked in the top 10. Applied
Mathematics moved up to number two; Logic
held on to its number two spot; Analysis
climbed to number three; Discrete
Mathematics and Combinatorics leaped to
number six; and finally, Algebra/Number
Theory/Algebraic Geometry rose to number
nine. These rankings confirm the upward
momentum of the department in recent
years. Also, the Academic Ranking of World
Universities (ARWU) released its widely
used annual ranking of the world's
research universities in December 2009,
ranking UCLA Math number 10 among all
mathematics departments in the world and
sixth among those in the U.S. Across
fields, UCLA Math was one of two UCLA
departments/schools to rank in the top 10
worldwide.
Click
Here for more on the U.S. News &
World Report rankings...
Click
Here for more on the ARWU world
rankings... |
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| UCLA Math Faculty
Elected to the American Academy of Arts
& Sciences |
Mark
Green |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professors Andrea Bertozzi and Mark Green
join 229 leaders in the sciences, social
sciences, the humanities, the arts,
business and public affairs who have been
elected to the American Academy of Arts
& Sciences in recognition of
preeminent contributions to their
disciplines and to society at large.
Bertozzi and Green are two of eight UCLA
professors to be named new fellows this
year. A center for independent policy
research, the academy celebrates the 230th
anniversary of its founding this year.
Click
Here for more information... |
Andrea
Bertozzi |
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|
|
|
| Nemmers Prize in
Mathematics Awarded to Terence Tao |
Terence
Tao |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Terence Tao has been awarded the
prestigious Frederic Esser Nemmers Prize
in Mathematics “for mathematics of
astonishing breadth, depth and
originality.” Sponsored by
Northwestern University, two Nemmers
prizes in mathematics and economics are
awarded every other year to scholars who
make major contributions to new knowledge
or the development of significant new
modes of analysis and are designed to
recognize “work of lasting significance”
in the respective disciplines.
Click
Here for more information... |
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|
| Joseph Teran Receives
Office of Naval Research Young
Investigator Award |
Joseph
Teran |
|
|
The Office of Naval
Research (ONR) has awarded UCLA
Mathematics Assistant Professor Joseph
Teran a prestigious Young Investigator
Award for his proposal, "Manycore
Accelerated Algorithms for Computational
Solid and Fluid Mechanics." ONR's Young
Investigator Program identifies and
supports outstanding academic scientists
and engineers who show exceptional promise
for doing creative research. One of 17
recipients, Teran is the only
mathematician to receive the 2010 award.
Click
Here for more information... |
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| Andrea Bertozzi Named
as 2010 SIAM Fellow |
Andrea
Bertozzi |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Andrea Bertozzi was selected as
one of 34 new fellows of the Society for
Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM)
for her contributions to the application
of mathematics in compressible flow, thin
films, image processing, and swarming. The
fellows program was inaugurated last year
as an honorific designation conferred on
members distinguished for their key
contributions to the fields of applied
mathematics and computational science.
Professor Emeritus Tony Chan (President,
Hong Kong University of Science and
Technology) was also named as a fellow
this year. Applied math faculty members
Russel Caflisch and Stanley Osher were
named SIAM fellows in 2009. |
|
|
| Ostrowski Prize
Awarded to Sorin Popa |
Sorin
Popa |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
professor and chair Sorin Popa was awarded
the 2009 Ostrowski Prize for his striking
work in von Neumann algebras and orbit
equivalence ergodic theory. Since 1989,
the prize has been awarded every two years
for outstanding recent achievements in
pure mathematics and the theoretical
foundations of numerical analysis by an
international jury from the universities
of Basel, Jerusalem, Waterloo and the
academies of Denmark and the Netherlands.
UCLA Math professor Terence Tao received
the award in 2005.
Click
Here for AMS citation and additional
information... |
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|
| UCLA Math PhD Awarded
Clay Research Fellowship |
Tim
Austin |
|
|
The Clay Mathematics
Institute has appointed UCLA Mathematics
2010 PhD Tim Austin to a five year Clay
Research Fellowship beginning July 1.
Austin will receive his PhD in June of
this year. His thesis, “Pleasant
extensions for nonconventional ergodic
averages” (working title), was carried out
under the supervision of UCLA Math
professor Terence Tao. Clay Research
Fellows are selected for their research
achievements and their potential to become
leaders in research mathematics. Past UCLA
Math recipients include Adrian Ioana,
Ciprian Manolescu, and Terence Tao.
Click
Here for more information... |
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| UCLA
Mathematicians and Anthropologist Team Up
to Fight Crime |
Andrea
Bertozzi, Martin Short
& Jeffrey Brantingham |
|
UCLA Math
professor and director of applied
mathematics Andrea Bertozzi, and assistant
adjunct professor of mathematics Martin
Short have collaborated with UCLA
associate professor of anthropology
Jeffrey Brantingham and George Tita (UC
Irvine) to apply sophisticated math to
urban crime patterns to determine which
types of crime “hotspots” in Los Angeles
are most likely to be affected by
intensified police actions. Their work on
crime hotspots appeared this week in the
Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences (PNAS) and will be the cover
article of the March 2 print edition.
Click
Here for more on their crime-busting
research...
Click
Here for a video story of their
research...
Click
Here for the PNAS research article... |
|
|
| Monica Visan Awarded
Sloan Research Fellowship |
Monica
Visan |
|
|
The Alfred P. Sloan
Foundation has awarded UCLA Mathematics
Assistant Professor Monica Visan a 2010
Sloan Research Fellowship in mathematics.
Established in 1955, the two-year
fellowships seek to stimulate fundamental
research by early-career scientists and
scholars of outstanding promise. Visan,
who joined UCLA Math in 2009, is one of
the top young researchers in the field of
nonlinear Schrödinger equations and
has made significant progress towards one
of the major open problems in her field of
interest, the global regularity and
well-posedness problem for the
mass-critical nonlinear Schrödinger
equation. Visan is one of five UCLA 2010
Sloan fellowship recipients.
Click
Here for a list of recipients...
Click
Here for more on Visan’s research... |
|
|
| UCLA
Math Logicians Awarded 2009 Sacks Prize |
Isaac
Goldbring |
|
Grigor
Sargsyan |
|
The Association
for Symbolic Logic (ASL) has awarded UCLA
Mathematics Assistant Adjunct Professors
Isaac Goldbring and Grigor Sargsyan the
prestigious 2009 Sacks Prize for best
dissertations in logic worldwide. For
Goldbring’s thesis, “Nonstandard Methods
in Lie Theory,” ASL notes that he applies
model theory to a fundamental problem from
topological group theory and that the main
result replaces an incorrect proof in a
widely cited paper from 1957 using totally
new ideas. Sargsyan’s thesis, “A Tale of
Hybrid Mice” is noted for having
“uncountably many new ideas.” The work
addresses a central conjecture of inner
model theory, resolving it in settings
that were previously completely beyond
reach, and upending conventional wisdom on
the strength of determinacy hypotheses.
The annual Sacks Prize was established to
honor Professor Gerald Sacks of MIT and
Harvard for his unique contribution to
mathematical logic, particularly as
adviser to a large number of outstanding
PhD students. Previous UCLA Math Sacks
prize recipients include Professors
Gregory Hjorth (1994), Itay Neeman (1996,
joint) and Matthias Aschenbrenner (2001),
and 2008 PhD Inessa Epstein (2008).
Click
Here for additional information... |
|
|
| Sorin Popa Receives
2010 AMS Moore Prize |
Sorin
Popa |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
professor and chair Sorin Popa has been
named the recipient of the 2010 American
Mathematical Society (AMS) E. H. Moore
Research Article Prize. Popa is honored
for his paper, “On the Superrigidity of
Malleable Actions with Spectral Gap,”
which “represents a major breakthrough in
the author’s remarkable program concerning
von Neumann rigidity, orbit equivalence,
and strong rigidity of ergodic measure
preserving actions of countable groups.”
Experts in this area commented that Popa’s
work “completely changed the landscape of
operator algebras.” The prize is awarded
every three years for an outstanding
research article that appeared in the past
six years in one of the primary AMS
research journals.
Click
Here for full citation and additional
information... |
|
|
| Terence Tao Awarded
2010 King Faisal International Prize for
Science |
Terence
Tao |
|
|
UCLA Mathematics
Professor Terence Tao has been named
co-winner of the King Faisal International
Prize for Science (mathematics). Tao is
noted for “his highly original solutions
of very difficult and important problems
and for his technical brilliance in the
use of the necessary mathematical
machinery.” The King Faisal Foundation was
established in 1976 in honor of the late
King Faisal ibn Abd Al Aziz of Saudia
Arabia. The international awards encompass
five prize categories, including science,
which was added in 1982 and covers
physics, mathematics, chemistry and
biology.
Click
Here for 2010 awardee information... |
|
|
| Alfred
Hales Elected as 2009 AAAS Fellow |
Alfred
Hales |
|
In November, the
American Association for the Advancement
of Science (AAAS) Council elected UCLA
Mathematics Professor Emeritus Alfred
Hales to the rank of AAAS Fellow. Each
year the council elects members whose
“efforts on behalf of the advancement of
science or its applications are
scientifically or socially distinguished.”
In the section on mathematics, Hales has
been honored for his contributions in
algebra and combinatorics, the
Hales-Jewett Theorem, characterization of
infinite abelian groups by Ulm invariants,
and service as UCLA Math department chair
and director of the Institute for Defense
Analyses Center for Communications
Research. “Triple A-S” is an international
non-profit organization dedicated to
advancing science worldwide and publishes
the journal Science, the largest paid
circulation of any peer-reviewed general
science journal in the world.
Click
Here for complete list of new
fellows-> |
|
|
| UCLA Math Faculty
Assume Leadership Positions in AMS 2009
Election |
Mark
Green |
|
|
The membership of the
American Mathematical Society (AMS) has
elected UCLA Mathematics professor and
IPAM Director Emeritus Mark Green to a
five year term to serve on its Board of
Trustees. Professor and outgoing
department chair Christoph Thiele was
elected as a member at large of the
Council of the AMS for a three year term.
Green and Thiele begin their terms
February 1, 2010.
Click
Here for full AMS 2009 election
results... |
Christoph
Thiele |
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| UCLA
Math Seeks Exceptional Student for
Undergraduate Scholarship |
UCLA Mathematics has
launched a new scholarship to be granted
to an entering freshman who has an
exceptional background and promise in
mathematics. The UCLA Math Undergraduate
Merit Scholarship provides for full
tuition, and a room and board allowance.
To be considered for fall 2010, candidates
must apply on or before November 30, 2009.
Click
Here for details and online application
for the scholarship... |
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| UCLA
Math Fall 2009 Newsletter Available Online |
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| Simons
Foundation Awards Two Postdoctoral
Fellowships to UCLA Math |
The Simons Foundation
has chosen UCLA Math to host two
prestigious Simons Postdoctoral Fellows in
mathematics as part of its new program to
provide 68 postdoctoral positions in the
fields of mathematics, theoretical physics
and theoretical computer science. The
department fellowships are three-year
positions with the first fellow to be
appointed in the fall of 2010 and a second
fellow to be appointed in the fall of
2011. UCLA Math was selected by a
committee of distinguished scientists for
its dynamic research environment that
meets the foundation’s goal of providing
the best possible postdoctoral training to
a group of the strongest graduating PhDs.
Fellowships will be granted to exceptional
candidates who receive their PhD in the
academic year preceding the year in which
they would become fellows. More
information and application details about
the Simons Postdoctoral Fellowship program
at UCLA is available at www.mathjobs.org.
Click
Here for more information about the
Simons Foundation...
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| International
Congress of Mathematicians 2010 Preview of
Invited Talks |
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ICM 2010 will showcase
a spectacular spate of invited talks for
department faculty. Applied mathematician
Stanley Osher leads the way with an
invitation to give a plenary address which
will be on new algorithms in information
science. Fellow UCLA Math colleagues Paul
Balmer, Chandrashekhar Khare, Dimitri
Shlyakhtenko, and Benjamin Sudakov are
invited lecturers in algebra, number
theory, functional analysis, and
combinatorics, respectively. UCLA Math
alum and IPAM science advisory board chair
Peter W. Jones will also give a plenary
address. The congress will be held in
Hyderabad, India, August 19 ~V 27, 2010. |
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| In
memoriam: Leo Sario, Professor Emeritus,
1916 – 2009 |
Professor Emeritus Leo
Sario died of a heart attack at his Santa
Monica home on August 15, 2009. He was 93.
In Finland during World War II, Sario was
recognized as an excellent teacher and
officer who made key contributions to the
defense of the country, all while
diligently pursuing his mathematical
studies. After the war, Sario received his
PhD under Rolf Nevanlinna and helped to
establish the National Academy of Finland.
Moving to the U.S. in the 1950s, he worked
at Princeton, MIT, Stanford and finally
UCLA, from which he retired in 1986. Sario
created the theory of principal functions
and wrote five major books including
Riemann Surfaces with Lars Ahlfors,
Classification Theory of Riemann Surfaces
with M. Nakai, and Principal Functions
with Burton Rodin. He also published over
130 research papers and mentored 36
doctoral students.
Click
Here for a full account of Leo Sario's
Life & Accomplishments by Burt
Rodin...
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| UCLA Math
Student-Athlete Alterraun Verner Tackles
Football and Proofs |
Alterraun
Verner |
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Watch Bruin senior
star cornerback and mathematics-applied
science major Alterraun Verner talk about
the rewards of tackling quarterbacks on
the field and math proofs off the field in
My Big UCLA Moment. Verner was named to
the pre-season “Watch List” for the Lott
Trophy and is a two-time Pac-10
All-Academic team player.
Click
Here to watch "My Big UCLA Moment" on
YouTube... |
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| Sorin
Popa Accepts UCLA Mathematics Department
Chairmanship |
Sorin
Popa |
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Effective July 1,
2009, Professor Sorin Popa assumes the
position of chair of the UCLA Department
of Mathematics. A professor at UCLA since
1987, Popa is a world-leading researcher
in the areas of functional analysis,
operator algebras, subfactor theory, and
ergodic theory. His honors include a
Guggenheim fellowship in 1995 and two
invited addresses at the International
Congress of Mathematicians, most recently
in 2006 as plenary speaker. He has
frequently held visiting positions in
France, and from 1996 - 1998 was professor
at the University of Geneva. Acting Dean
Joseph Rudnick of the Division of Physical
Sciences is enthusiastic about Popa's
appointment and praises outgoing chair
Professor Christoph Thiele for the
impressive strides the department has made
during his three year tenure, expressing
his belief that Thiele will be “remembered
as one of the great chairs of your
department, indeed the campus.”
Congratulations to Professor Thiele for
his extraordinary service and best of luck
to Professor Popa in his new role.
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| NSF
Awards Major Training Grants to UCLA Math |
Effective July 1,
2009, the UCLA Department of Mathematics
will be awarded two major Research
Training Groups (RTG) grants from the
National Science Foundation, one in
algebra/number theory and the other in
analysis. The RTG grants are part of the
NSF initiative to enhance the mathematical
sciences workforce in the 21st century and
will fund numerous departmental programs,
as well as provide support for graduate
students, undergraduates and postdocs.
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| UCLA
Math Prof Joseph Teran Talks Virtual
Surgery on YouTube |
For a peek in to next
generation surgery powered by
mathematics... Visit Xbox
+ math = virtual surgery.
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| UCLA Math PhD Awarded
Clay Liftoff Fellowship |
Victor
Lie |
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The Clay Mathematics
Institute has named UCLA Mathematics PhD
Victor Lie as a 2009 Clay Liftoff fellow.
Lie will complete his thesis "Relational
time-frequency analysis" under Professor
Christoph Thiele in June and is widely
known in the field for his paper "The
(weak-L2) Boundedness of the
Quadratic Carleson Operator." Lie will use
the Liftoff award this summer at the
University of Chicago then assume a
three-year Veblen Research Instructorship,
which is a joint position at Princeton
University and the Institute for Advanced
Study. The Clay Liftoff Fellowships are
awarded to young mathematicians who have
demonstrated mathematical research of
quality and significance, and who show the
potential to be leaders in their field.
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| NSF
Awards Postdoctoral Fellowships to UCLA
Math PhDs |
UCLA Mathematics PhDs
Mark Blunk and Michael Vanvalkenburgh have
been named recipients of the National
Science Foundation 2009 Mathematical
Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowship
(MSPRF). Blunk will receive his PhD in
June under the supervision of Professor
Alexander Merkurjev and will conduct his
fellowship at the University of British
Columbia. Vanvalkenburgh will conduct his
research at the University of California,
Berkeley and will receive his PhD this
June under the supervision of Professor
Michael Hitrik.
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| Curtis
Center Hosts Julia Robinson Math Festival |
On April 23, UCLA
Mathematics' Philip C. Curtis Jr. Center
for Mathematics and Teaching, and the
Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics
(IPAM) hosted 270 Los Angeles-area middle
and high students for the first Julia
Robinson Mathematics Festival held in
Southern California. UCLA math faculty,
graduate students, IPAM visiting
researchers, high school instructors and
local puzzle masters guided students as
they tested their skills and learned new
math topics through activity stations. The
event also featured a talk by UCLA
mathematics professor Joseph Teran, who
discussed the role of math in creating
visual effects for movies, video games and
virtual surgery simulations. UCLA math
alumna Peggy Otsubo represented the
event's corporate sponsor and spoke to
students on how mathematics is used at
Northrop Grumman. Major funding was also
provided by Nancy and Nelson Blachman
through the Mathematical Sciences Research
Institute at Berkeley.
Click
Here for more festival information...
Click
Here to see it on YouTube... |
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| UCLA
Math Faculty Elected to the American
Academy of Arts & Sciences |
Stanley
Osher |
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Terence
Tao |
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On April 20, UCLA
Mathematics Professors Stanley Osher and
Terence Tao joined 210 distinguished
scholars, scientists, writers, artists,
and corporate and philanthropic leaders
who were elected to the American Academy
of Arts&
Sciences in recognition of preeminent
contributions to their disciplines and to
society at large. Six UCLA professors were
named new fellows this year. An
independent policy research center, the
American Academy of Arts & Sciences
undertakes studies of complex and emerging
problems. Current academy research focuses
on science and global security, social
policy, the humanities and culture, and
education.
Click
Here for a complete list of 2009
fellows... |
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| Tony Chan Appointed
President of University in Hong Kong |
Tony
Chan |
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Tony Chan has been
appointed the next president of Hong Kong
University of Science and Technology for a
five-year term, effective September 1. A
UCLA professor of mathematics since 1986,
Chan was dean of the Division of Physical
Sciences from 2001 to 2006 in the College
of Letters and Science. In October 2006,
Chan took a temporary leave from his
faculty position at UCLA to become the NSF
assistant director in charge of its
Mathematical and Physical Sciences
Directorate to guide and manage research
funding totaling approximately $1 billion
a year to support astronomy, physics,
chemistry, mathematics, materials science
and multidisciplinary activities.
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| Professor
Andrea Bertozzi to be 2009 Sonia
Kovalevsky Lecturer |
Sonia
Kovalevsky |
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Andrea
Bertozzi |
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The Association
for Women in Mathematics (AWM) and the
Society for Industrial and Applied
Mathematics (SIAM) has invited UCLA
Mathematics Professor Andrea Bertozzi to
give the annual Sonia Kovalevsky Lecture
in July at
the 2009 SIAM annual meeting. Established
in 2003, the lectures honor women who have
made fundamental and sustained
contributions to applied or computational
mathematics. Bertozzi works in a wide
range of areas in applied mathematics
including nonlinear partial differential
equations, thin films, image processing,
swarming and crime modeling. SIAM has also
invited UCLA Mathematics Professor Russel
Caflisch to be a topical speaker at the
annual meeting.
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