N E W S L E T T E R O F T H E E U R O P E A N M A T H E M A T I C A L S O C I E T Y Feature History Interview ERCOM Contour dynamics Stefan Banach John Ball ICTP p. 25 p. 29 p. 35 p. 41 March 2009 Issue 71 ISSN 1027-488X SSS EEE European MMM MMM Mathematical EEE SSS Society Oxford University Press is pleased to announce that all EMS members can benefit from a 20% discount on a large range of our Mathematics books. For more information please visit: http://www.oup.co.uk/sale/science/ems d Statistical Methods in Computing with Cells r Environmental Advances in Membrane o Epidemiology Computing f Duncan C. Thomas Pierluigi Frisco x A systematic treatment of the A monograph treating a fascinating and O fast growing area of research, focussing on statistical challenges that arise in the theoretical computer science aspects of membrane environmental health studies and the computing and giving a comprehensive understanding of use epidemiologic data in formulating public policy, m the computing power of the models considered. A clear at a level suitable for graduate students and and up-to-date starting point for membrarne computing. epidemiologic researchers. o February 2009 | 448 pp April 2009 | 336 pp Paperback | 978-0-19-923290-1 | £24.95 Hardback | 978-0-19-954286-4 | £50 .00 r Hardback | 978-0-19-923289-5 | £55.00 f Introduction to Metric Statistics and Informatics in s and Topological Spaces Cancer Research k Second Edition Edited by Carsten Wiuf and Claus L. o Andersen Wilson A Sutherland o This fully updated new edition of Wilson A collection of chapters from carefully chosen experts covering the theory behind Sutherland's classic text, Introduction to B the complex mathematical, statistical, and Metric and Topological Spaces, establishes bioinformatics tools needed to extract, the language of metric and topological handle, and process data and their application to real data. spaces with continuity as the motivating concept, before s developing its discussion to cover compactness, June 2009 | 304 pp c connectedness, and completeness. Hardback | 978-0-19-953287-2 | £39.50 i June 2009 | 224 pp t Paperback | 978-0-19-956308-1 | £19.99 Hardback | 978-0-19-956307-4 | £45 .00 a m Oxford Handbook of the Consumer Credit Models History of Mathematics Pricing, Profit and Portfolios e Edited by Eleanor Robson and Lyn C. Thomas Jacqueline Stedall h A text aimed at credit analysts in industry Explores the history of mathematics, and students in Statistics, Management t addressing what mathematics has been and what it has meant to practice it. Science, Operational Research and Banking a Thirty-six self-contained chapters, each and Finance Masters courses that will use written by a specialist, provide a simple probability models and logical M fascinating overview of 5000 years of arguments to explain consumer credit scoring. mathematics and its key cultures for academics in mathematics, historians of science, and general historians. January 2009 | 400 pp Hardback | 978-0-19-923213-0 | £39.95 | December 2008 | 928 pp m Hardback | 978-0-19-921312-2 | £85.00 Geometric Mechanics and Symmetry o Multiscale Methods c From Finite to Infinite Dimensions Bridging the Scales in Science and Engineering . p Edited by Jacob Fish Darryl D. Holm, Tanya Schmah, and Cristina Stoica u A graduate level text based partly on lectures in geometry, o This volume is intended as a reference book for scientists, mechanics, and symmetry given at Imperial College London, . engineers and graduate students practicing in traditional w this book links traditional classical mechanics texts and engineering and science disciplines as well as in emerging advanced modern mathematical treatments of the subject. w fields of nanotechnology, biotechnology, microelectronics w and energy. May 2009 | 460 pp Paperback | 978-0-19-921291-0 | £29.50 | Hardback | 978-0-19-921290-3 | £65.00 June 2009 | 456 pp Hardback | 978-0-19-923385-4 | £55.00 discover new books by email! 1 order direct from oup Subscribe to Oxford e.news and receive a monthly bulletin from OUP Tel: +44 (0)1536 741727 with information on new books in mathematics. Just visit: email: [email protected] www.oup.com/uk/emailnews www.oup.com online: www.oup.com Contents Editorial Team European Editor-in-Chief Mariolina Bartolini Bussi (Math. Education) Mathematical Vicente Muñoz Dip. Matematica – Universitá ICMAT – CSIC Via G. Campi 213/b C/Serrano, 113bis I-41100 Modena, Italy E-28006, Madrid, Spain e-mail: [email protected] Society e-mail: [email protected] Dmitry Feichtner-Kozlov FB3 Mathematik Associate Editors University of Bremen Postfach 330440 Vasile Berinde D-28334 Bremen, Germany Newsletter No. 71, March 2009 Department of Mathematics e-mail: [email protected] and Computer Science Ivan Netuka Universitatea de Nord (Recent Books) Baia Mare EMS Agenda 2 Mathematical Institute ...................................................................................................................................................... Facultatea de Stiinte Charles University Str. Victoriei, nr. 76 Editorial – K. Schmidt 3 Sokolovská 83 ........................................................................................................................... 430072, Baia Mare, Romania 186 75 Praha 8 New editors of the Newsletter 4 e-mail: [email protected] Czech Republic ..................................................................................................... Krzysztof Ciesielski e-mail: [email protected] New members of the EC 5 .................................................................................................................... (Societies) Mathematics Institute Mădălina Păcurar Report of the EC meeting – V. Berinde .......................................................................... 6 (Conferences) Jagellonian University Department of Statistics, Obituary: O. Schramm – W. Werner 9 Reymonta 4 ................................................................................... Forecast and Mathematics PL-30-059, Kraków, Poland Babes ,-Bolyai University Communicating Mathematics – R. Wilson................................................................... 15 e-mail: [email protected] T. Mihaili St. 58–60 Martin Raussen 400591 Cluj-Napoca, Romania Tribute to A. Lichnerowicz – Y. Kosmann-Schwarzbach ............................ 21 Department of Mathematical e-mail: [email protected]; Contour dynamics for 2D active scalars – D. Córdoba & Sciences e-mail: [email protected] Aalborg University Fredrik Bajers Vej 7G Frédéric Paugam P. Gancedo ........................................................................................................................................................... 25 Institut de Mathématiques DK-9220 Aalborg Øst, Facts and myths about Stefan Banach – R. Duda 29 de Jussieu ............................................. Denmark 175, rue de Chevaleret e-mail: [email protected] F-75013 Paris, France Interview with John Ball – T.Körner ...................................................................................... 35 Robin Wilson e-mail: [email protected] ICMI Column – M. Bartolini Bussi 38 ........................................................................................... Department of Mathematical Sciences Ulf Persson ERME Column – B. Jaworski & F. Arzarello 39 ............................................................... The Open University Matematiska Vetenskaper Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Chalmers tekniska högskola ERCOM: ICTP .................................................................................................................................................. 41 e-mail: [email protected] S-412 96 Göteborg, Sweden Zentralblatt Corner – O. Teschke 43 e-mail: [email protected] .......................................................................................... Copy Editor Themistocles M. Rassias Book Review: Dimensions: a walk through mathematics – (Problem Corner) F. Paugam 45 Chris Nunn Department of Mathematics ............................................................................................................................................................. 4 Rosehip Way National Technical University Solved and Unsolved Problems – Th. M. Rassias 46 Lychpit of Athens ........................................ Basingstoke RG24 8SW, UK Zografou Campus Forthcoming Conferences – M. Pa˘curar 50 ........................................................................ e-mail: [email protected] GR-15780 Athens, Greece e-mail: [email protected]. Recent Books – I. Netuka & V. Soucˇek 55 ................................................................. Editors Erhard Scholz University Wuppertal The views expressed in this Newsletter are those of the Chris Budd Department C, Mathematics, authors and do not necessarily represent those of the (Applied Math./Applications and Interdisciplinary Center EMS or the Editorial Team. of Math.) for Science and Technology Department of Mathematical Studies (IZWT), ISSN 1027-488X Sciences, University of Bath 42907 Wuppertal, Germany © 2009 European Mathematical Society Bath BA2 7AY, UK e-mail: [email protected] Published by the e-mail: [email protected] Vladimír Souček EMS Publishing House Jorge Buescu (Recent Books) ETH-Zentrum FLI C4 Dep. Matemática, Faculdade Mathematical Institute CH-8092 Zürich, Switzerland. de Ciências, Edifício C6, Charles University Piso 2 Campo Grande Sokolovská 83 homepage: www.ems-ph.org 1749-006 Lisboa, Portugal 186 75 Praha 8 e-mail: [email protected] Czech Republic For advertisements contact: [email protected] e-mail: [email protected] EMS Newsletter March 2009 1 EMS News EMS Executive Committee EMS Agenda President Ordinary Members 2009 Prof. Ari Laptev Prof. Zvi Artstein 4–8 March (2007–10) Department of Mathematics 4th World Conference on 21st Century Mathematics, Department of Mathematics The Weizmann Institute of Lahore (Pakistan), wc2009.sms.edu.pk South Kensington Campus Science Imperial College London Rehovot, Israel 21–22 March SW7 2AZ London, UK e-mail: [email protected] EMS Executive Committee Meeting, Athens, Greece e-mail: [email protected] Stephen Huggett: [email protected] and Prof. Franco Brezzi Department of Mathematics Istituto di Matematica Applicata 1 May Royal Institute of Technology e Tecnologie Informatiche del Deadline for submission of material for the June issue of the SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden C.N.R. EMS Newsletter e-mail: [email protected] via Ferrata 3 Vicente Muñoz: [email protected] 27100, Pavia, Italy Vice-Presidents e-mail: [email protected] 9–10 May Meeting of Presidents of national mathematical Societies, Prof. Mireille Martin- Banach Center, Bedlewo, Poland Prof. Pavel Exner Deschamps Ari Laptev: [email protected] (2005–10) (2007–10) Department of Theoretical Département de 21 May Physics, NPI mathématiques International Council for Industrial and Applied Mathematics Academy of Sciences Bâtiment Fermat (ICIAM) Board meeting, Oslo (Norway) 25068 Rez – Prague 45, avenue des Etats-Unis Czech Republic F-78030 Versailles Cedex, 8–11 June e-mail: [email protected] France 25th Nordic and 1st British-Nordic Congress of Mathematicians Prof. Helge Holden e-mail: [email protected] University of Oslo, Norway (2007–10) http://www.math.uio.no/2009/ Department of Mathematical Prof. Igor Krichever Sciences Department of Mathematics 2010 Norwegian University of Columbia University Science and Technology 2990 Broadway 19–27 August Alfred Getz vei 1 New York, NY 10027, USA International Congress of Mathematicians, ICM2010, NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway and Hyderabad (India), www.icm2010.org.in e-mail: [email protected] Landau Institute of Theoretical Physics 2012 Russian Academy of Sciences Secretary Moscow 2–7 July e-mail: [email protected] 6th European Mathematical Congress, Kraków (Poland) Dr. Stephen Huggett www.euro-math-soc.eu (2007–10) Dr. Martin Raussen School of Mathematics Department of Mathematical Sciences, Aalborg University and Statistics Fredrik Bajers Vej 7G University of Plymouth DK-9220 Aalborg Øst, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK Denmark e-mail: [email protected] e-mail: [email protected] EMS Secretariat EMS Publicity Officer Treasurer Ms. Riitta Ulmanen Vasile Berinde Prof. Jouko Väänänen Department of Mathematics Department of Mathematics (2007–10) and Statistics and Computer Science Department of Mathematics P.O. Box 68 North University of Baia Mare and Statistics (Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2b) 430122 Baia Mare, Romania Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2b FI-00014 University of Helsinki e-mail: [email protected] FIN-00014 University of Helsinki Finland Finland Tel: (+358)-9-191 51507 e-mail: jouko.vaananen@helsinki.fi Fax: (+358)-9-191 51400 and e-mail: ems-offi ce@helsinki.fi Institute for Logic, Language Web site: http://www.emis.de and Computation University of Amsterdam Plantage Muidergracht 24 1018 TV Amsterdam The Netherlands e-mail: [email protected] 2 EMS Newsletter March 2009 Editorial Editorial vents the EMS from taking on some responsibilities that cannot be borne by national societies but which would be of the utmost importance for European mathematics. Some of the activities of the EMS are very successful Klaus Schmidt in spite of its operation on a very restricted budget (ex- amples are the coordination of conferences, in particular I was a member of the Executive Com- the European Congress of Mathematics, and the EMS mittee (EC) of the EMS from 2004 to Publishing House is another). 2008. Due to confl icting demands on my In other respects the success of the EMS has been time from other commitments I was un- more modest. Let me mention an example which is in- able to extend my membership of that dicative both of the success and the limitations of math- committee beyond 2008 and with regret ematical cooperation in Europe. I left the EC in December 2008. In 1995, the IHÉS in Bures-sur-Yvette, the Isaac New- My time on the EC was both interesting and reward- ton Institute in Cambridge and the Max-Planck-Institut ing. The two presidents of the EMS I served under were für Mathematik in Bonn founded the European Post- Sir John Kingman and Ari Laptev, both of whom im- Doctoral Institute for Mathematical Sciences (EPDI) to pressed me very much with their dedication to the cause encourage mobility of young scientists on a European of European Mathematics and their energy in pursuing scale. The EPDI was subsequently enlarged with the this cause. The regular meetings of the EC were always inclusion of the Max-Planck-Institut für Mathematik in a pleasure to attend (not only because they were usu- den Naturwissenschaften in Leipzig, the Mittag-Leffl er ally held in nice locations) and I enjoyed the friendly Institute in Djursholm, the Erwin Schrödinger Institute atmosphere, the quality and sincerity of the discussions in Vienna, the Banach Center in Warsaw, the Centre de and the insights they provided into the challenges facing Recerca Matemàtica in Barcelona, the Forschungsinsti- both the EMS and European mathematics. tut für Mathematik at the ETH Zürich and the Math- Before turning to some of these challenges I should ematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach. All these recall a little bit of the history of the EMS. institutes are members of ERCOM (European Research The EMS was founded in 1990 but its origins go back Centres on Mathematics), one of the committees of the to attempts by the European Science Foundation in 1976 EMS which has the purpose of liaison and cooperation to improve cooperation between European mathemati- between these centres. cal societies. At the International Congress of Mathema- Each year the EPDI offers 7 two-year positions to ticians in 1978 a European Mathematical Council (EMC) outstanding European post-docs to give them the op- was created to facilitate this cooperation but efforts in portunity to work at EPDI Institutes of their choice for this direction were hampered by the political divisions periods of 6 to 12 months at each selected institution. of Europe at that time. Although this scheme is quite limited in terms of The political changes in 1989 raised hopes and of- numbers and funding, it attracts excellent applicants, fered opportunities for new developments, and in Octo- whose number exceeds the number of available positions ber 1990 a meeting was hosted by the Polish Academy of by a factor of fi ve. However, many of the best selected Sciences, under the auspices of the EMC, to draw up the candidates for the EPDI are lost every year to competing statutes of a European Mathematical Society. offers by leading US universities. The cultural and scientifi c diversity of Europe, from The reason for this is not only the excellence of these which this continent draws much of its strength and cre- US universities but also the attractiveness of the huge ativity, was something of a mixed blessing for attempts US market for post-doc and tenure-track positions, the to forge a union of national mathematical societies but outstanding working environments at some of its scien- after some lively discussions the statutes of the EMS, as tifi c institutions and the great diversity of funding sources a society composed of individual members (rather than available in the US. a federation of national mathematical societies), were A small, and perhaps symbolic, measure to assist accepted. The mathematical societies participating in young mathematicians seeking positions in Europe (and that meeting joined the newly established EMS as full perhaps help programmes like the EPDI in the process) members and the precursor of the EMS, the EMC, was would be an expansion of the EMS database of math- formally dissolved. ematical post-doc and longer term academic positions The establishment of the EMS as a mathematical so- at http://www.euro-math-soc.eu/jobs.html, modelled on ciety separate from the national societies has fi nancial the AMS services ‘EIMS’ and ‘Mathjobs’ available at implications. Practically all the money of the EMS comes http://www.ams.org/eims/ and http://www.mathjobs.org/ from individual and institutional membership fees but jobs respectively. The provision of a comprehensive da- the percentage of members of individual mathematical tabase of mathematical job offers would give easy access societies who have joined the EMS varies enormously, to employment opportunities for mathematicians across largely due to the varying degrees of encouragement by Europe and would require only a moderate amount of these national societies. Taken across Europe, the per- money, resources and manpower. centage of mathematicians who have joined the EMS is More substantial progress towards improving the still woefully low. The resulting fi nancial tightness pre- prospects of mathematical research in Europe will be EMS Newsletter March 2009 3 EMS News possible only through EU funding. Thanks to efforts it also brings direct benefi ts to its individual members. by many people (notably Ari Laptev, President of the For example, EMS members will soon be provided with EMS), ERCOM has now been recognized as one of the free access to the Zentralblatt MATH database. European Research Infrastructures for the next EU call in September 2009. This is signifi cant progress that un- If mathematicians want to enable the EMS to success- derlines the important role of the EMS in the scientifi c fully pursue its aim of benefi ting European mathematics, development of the European Union. they need to join it and to strengthen its role as an or- The EMS not only helps to get the voice of mathe- ganization representing the needs and interests of math- matics heard by European politicians and civil servants, ematical researchers across Europe. New members of He has been a recipient of the Wallenberg Prize of the Swedish Mathematics Society (2003), the Gustafsson the editorial Prize of the Goran Gustafsson Foundation (2004) and the European Prize in Combinatorics (2005). He obtained his doctorate from the Royal Institute board of the EMS of Technology, Stockholm, in 1996. After longer stays at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute at Berke- Newsletter ley, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the In- stitute for Advanced Study at Princeton, the University of Washington, Seattle, and Bern University, he became a senior lecturer at the Royal Institute of Technology, Starting in 2009, three new members will join the editorial Stockholm, and an assistant professor at the ETH Zu- board of the Newsletter of the EMS: Jorge Buescu, Dmitry rich. Feichtner-Kozlov and Erhard Scholz. Thanks are due to Currently he holds the Chair of Algebra and Geom- Giuseppe Anichini, Ana Bela Cruzeiro and Walter Purk- etry at the University of Bremen, Germany. ert, who all left the editorial board at the end of 2008, after He is married to a professor of mathematics, who many years of work in the Newsletter. works at the same department, and has a 2-year-old daughter. Jorge Buescu is a professor of math- ematics in the faculty of science of the Erhard Scholz was a student of math- University of Lisbon. He was a student ematics and physics at the universities of Ian Stewart at the University of War- of Bonn (Germany) and Warwick (UK), wick and is an active research mathema- obtaining a Diplom at Bonn in 1975 and tician with interests in dynamical systems completing his PhD in 1979 at Bonn, with and differential equations, the theory of a thesis on the history of the concept of computation and functional analysis. Be- manifold. sides research papers, he has published two mathematics He then obtained an assistantship books in Birkhäuser: Exotic attractors – from Liapunov at the University of Wuppertal, completing his Ha- stability to riddled basins (1997) and Bifurcation, symme- bilitation in 1986 on case studies relating theoretical try and patterns (2002) as editor. mathematics and applications in the 19th century. Af- He is also strongly committed to the dissemination of ter being a lecturer at the Universities of Wuppertal mathematical knowledge to the general public, writing and Bonn in 1984, he became a professor of the history articles and giving general talks at universities, schools of mathematics at the University of Wuppertal in the and other bodies. He has had three books (in Portuguese) latter part of 1989. During the summer of 1993, he ob- devoted to the popularisation of mathematics published tained a guest professorship at the Institute for History at Gradiva. He is currently the editor-in-chief of Gazeta of Science at the University of Göttingen. de Matemática, a publication of the Portuguese Math- Erhard Scholz is coeditor, with E. Brieskorn, F. ematical Society. Hirzebruch, W. Purkert and R. Remmert, of the Col- lected Works of Felix Hausdorff published by Springer Dmitry Feichtner-Kozlov works at the in 1996. He has also been editor, with E. Knobloch, of interface of discrete mathematics, alge- Science Network – Historical Studies, Birkhäuser, since braic topology and theoretical compu- 2001. He was a cofounding member of the “Interdiscipli- ter science. He is the author of over 40 nary Center for Science and Technology Studies”, Uni- research and survey articles and has re- versity of Wuppertal, with F. Steinle (history of science) cently published a book Combinatorial and G. Schiemann (philosophy of science) in the sum- Algebraic Topology (Springer Verlag) on mer of 2005. the topic. 4 EMS Newsletter March 2009 EMS News New members of the EMS executive committee At its meeting in Utretch (Holland) in July 2008 on the Computational Mechanics) in 2004 and he has been an weekend preceding the European Congress, the EMS ISI – Highly Cited Researcher since 2002. council elected four new members of the executive com- mittee of the society; Zvi Artstein, Franco Brezzi, Igor Igor Krichever is a leading researcher Krichever and Martin Raussen. The thanks of the society at the Landau Institute for Theoretical are due to Victor Buchstaber, Olga Gil-Medrano, Carlo Physics of the Russian Academy of Sci- Sbordone and Klaus Schmidt, who all left the executive ence and Chair of the Department of committee at the end of 2008 after many years of service Mathematics at Columbia University, to the society. New York. He obtained his PhD from Moscow State University in 1975 and his Zvi Artstein received his PhD from the Doctor of Science Degree in 1983. He is Hebrew University of Jerusalem under renowned for pioneering works on applications of alge- the supervision of Robert J. Aumann. braic geometry to the theory of classical and quantum Following a post-doctoral position at integrable systems and the spectral theory of periodic Brown University he joined the Weiz- operators. He is a member of the Council of the Moscow mann Institute of Science where, on top Mathematical Society. of his research, he held several admin- istrative positions. His current research Martin Raussen was born, raised and edu- interests are in dynamical systems and control (in par- cated in Germany. He studied mathemat- ticular variational limits, relaxation, singular perturba- ics and computer science at the universi- tions and hybrid systems) and also in decision theory, ties of Saarbrücken and Göttingen, where evolution and mathematical education. He believes that he obtained his PhD in 1981 with a thesis mathematics should not be separated from culture, tech- on the edge of differential and algebraic nology and the other sciences. topology. During his time as a graduate, he spent nine months in Paris, where he Franco Brezzi was born in Vimercate met his future Danish wife. As a result, he fi nally moved (Milan) on 29 April 1945. He graduat- to Denmark and established a family (with three daugh- ed in mathematics at the University of ters, meanwhile grown-up). After several post-doctorate Pavia in 1967 and became a full profes- stays at two universities, he was in 1984 appointed to his sor (of mathematical analysis) in Turin present job as associate professor at Aalborg University (Politecnico) in 1975. He moved back to in North Jutland, Denmark – 100 km from the Northern Pavia in 1977 and in 2006 he moved to tip of the peninsula. IUSS (Istituto Universitario di Studi Su- In recent years, he has participated in the efforts of periori, always in Pavia). a growing community attempting to make methods and He is presently the Director of the IMATI (Istituto ideas from algebraic topology useful for applications in di Matematica Applicata e Tecnologie Informatiche) of engineering and computer science. His research efforts the Italian National Research Council (CNR) and the have mainly centred on “Directed Algebraic Topology”, President of the Italian Mathematical Union. a new fi eld motivated from certain models in concurren- His scientifi c interests are mainly in scientifi c com- cy theory from theoretical computer science. He teach- puting and mostly in numerical analysis of partial differ- es and supervises students at Aalborg University from ential equations. From the point of view of applications, freshman to PhD-level. For several years, he was on the he has worked in several fi elds, including elasticity, elas- editorial board of the Danish Mathematical Society’s toplasticity, plate and shell bending, semiconductor de- Newsletter “Matilde”. Between 2003 and 2008, he was vice simulation, fl uid mechanics and electromagnetism. the editor-in-chief of the Newsletter of the European Recently he has been working on more methodological Mathematical Society; he will continue to work for the aspects, including the so-called Discontinuous Galer- newsletter, on a minor scale as an associate editor. kin methods and cochain discretizations of differential One of the central tasks of the EMS is to facilitate co- forms. operation and joint efforts between mathematicians and He is a member of the Istituto Lombardo, Accademia their societies in Europe at various levels. As a member di Scienze e Lettere (Milan), and the Accademia Nazon- of the executive committee, Martin intends to support, ale dei Lincei (Roma). He received the Gauss-Newton in particular, the Raising Public Awareness Committee Medal from the IACM (International Association for and the Meetings Committee. EMS Newsletter March 2009 5 EMS News EMS Executive Committee meeting Valencia, Spain, 8–9 November 2008 Vasile Berinde, EMS Publicity Officer The last EC meeting of 2008 was held in Valencia, a beau- Membership matters tiful and impressive city. The Executive Committee had The Eastern Europe Committee of EMS would help to to work hard to get through its long agenda in a day and a contact mathematicians in Albania and Moldova, which half, but succeeded. It was very pleasant to walk through are not members of EMS. the old town between the hotel and the Colegii Mayor Rector Peset of Universitat de Valencia, which hosted EMS Web Site the meeting. Helge Holden described work on the new site in order to Present at the meeting were: Ari Laptev (Chair), Pavel continue to improve it. Exner, Helge Holden, Stephen Huggett, Jouko Väänänen, Olga Gil-Medrano, Mireille Martin-Deschamps, Riitta 6th European Congress of Mathematics Ulmanen, Sir John Kingman, Luc Lemaire, Mario Prim- Andrzej Pelczar presented the progress so far in plan- icerio, Vicente Munoz, Andrzej Pelczar, Vasile Berinde ning the congress; the EC will set up the Programme and and the new elected EC members, Martin Raussen, Zvi Prizes Committees. Artstein, Franco Brezzi and Igor Krichever, whose term started on January 1, 2009. Except for Olga Gil-Medrano, EMS committees our gracious and hospitable hostess in Valencia, none of New EC members responsible for EMS committees were the EC members whose term ended on December 31, appointed: Igor Krichever, for Eastern Europe Commit- 2008, that is, Carlo Sbordone, Victor Buchstaber and tee; Franco Brezzi, for Education Committee (who was Klaus Schmidt, could attend. They were successfully re- asked to start completely re-forming this committee); placed by the newcomers. Martin Raussen, for Raising Public Awareness; and Zvi From the dense and varied business of this pleasant Artstein for Women and Mathematics Committee. As an and effi cient meeting, I will glean just a few matters: EMS Meetings Committee does not exist yet, the Presi- dent proposed Martin Raussen and Zvi Artstein to help President’s report set this committee up properly. This included the 5ECM in Amsterdam and its fi nances; applications for the ESF-EMS-ERCOM meetings; at- Publishing tendance at a European Round Table in Brussels with A brief account on the activity of EMS Publishing House representatives from industry; and the suggestion that was given by John Kingman; Vicente Munoz, the new the Executive Committee should set up an Ethics Com- Editor-in-Chief, reported on various changes in the edi- mittee. Following Martin Raussen’s proposal, the Presi- torial policy of the Newsletter as well as on the changes dent would start to form a search committee for the fu- to the Editorial Board; the new contract with FIZ-Karl- ture President and Vice-Presidents: this would also be on sruhe regarding Zentralblatt was described by Jouko the agenda of the next EC meeting. Väänänen. Treasurer’s report Closing matters A detailed report, including the budget for 2009–2010, Ari Laptev expressed the EC thanks to the Real Socie- was tabled and discussed. dad Matematica Espanola and especially to Olga Gil- Medrano for the wonderful hospitality in Valencia. Secretary’s report The EC agreed the proposal to design the future EC The EC agreed that the next meeting would be all day agendas in such a way that at least one open-ended dis- on the 21st of March 2009, and in the morning of the 22nd. cussion is included in each meeting. The venue was not decided during the meeting, although several suggestions were made. [Since the meeting, the Publicity Offi cer’s report venue has been agreed to be Athens.] The EC agreed to set up a link from the EMS web page to the web site containing all the photographs of EMS meetings, thus making it public. 6 EMS Newsletter March 2009 News 2011 ICPAM-CIMPA research schools call for projects The aim of the International Centre for Pure and Applied Mathematics ICPAM-CIMPA is to promote interna- tional cooperation in higher education and research in mathematics and their interactions, as well as related sub- jects, particularly computer science, for the benefi t of developing countries. Our action concentrates at the places where mathematics emerges and develops, and where a research project is possible. ICPAM-CIMPA is a UNESCO centre located in Nice, with fi nancial support from the French Ministère de l’enseignement supérieur et de la recherche, the Université de Nice Sophia Antipolis, and UNESCO. We organize research schools of about two weeks in developing countries. The purpose of these schools is to con- tribute to the research training of the new generation of mathematicians, women and men. Once selected by the Scientifi c committee and the Governing board of ICPAM-CIMPA, research schools are or- ganized locally with the help of ICPAM-CIMPA. ICPAM-CIMPA’s fi nancial contribution is essentially for young mathematicians from neighbouring countries to be able to attend the research school. ICPAM-CIMPA can help with obtaining founds from other sources. Additional information can be found in the instruction sheet (available on the web site of ICPAM-CIMPA). You can also write to ICPAM-CIMPA. Research schools call for projects begins on March 1st, 2009. The deadline for a pre-proposal is June 15, 2009. The complete proposal is due October 1st, 2009. Centre International de Mathématiques Pures et Appliquées International Centre for Pure and Applied Mathematics The application form can be found on ICPAM-CIMPA website, you can also write to [email protected] http://www.cimpa-icpam.org IRMA Lectures in Mathematics and Theoretical Physics IRMA Lectures in Mathematics and Theoretical Physics Handbook of Teichmüller Theory, Volume I Handbook of Teichmüller Theory, Volume II Editor: Athanase Papadopoulos Editor: Athanase Papadopoulos (IRMA, Strasbourg, France) (IRMA, Strasbourg, France) ISBN 978-3-03719-029-6 ISBN 978-3-03719-055-5 2007. 802 pages. Hardcover. 17.0 x 24.0 cm 2009. 882 pages. Hardcover. 17.0 x 24.0 cm 98.00 Euro 98.00 Euro The Teichmüller space of a surface was introduced by O. Teichmüller in the 1930s. It is a basic tool in the study of Riemann’s moduli space and of the mapping class group. These objects are fundamental in several fi elds of mathematics including algebraic geometry, number theory, topology, geometry, and dynamics. This multi-volume set deals with Teichmüller theory in the broadest sense, namely, as the study of moduli space of geometric structures on surfaces, with methods inspired or adapted from those of classical Teichmüller theory. The aim is to give a complete panorama of this generalized Teichmüller theory and of its applications in various fi elds of mathematics. The volumes consist of chapters, each of which is dedicated to a specifi c topic. The purpose of this handbook is to give a panorama of some of the most important aspects of Teichmüller theory. The handbook should be useful to specialists in the fi eld, to graduate students, and more generally to mathematicians who want to learn about the subject. All the chapters are self-contained and have a pedagogical character. They are written by leading experts in the subject. This handbook is an essential reference for graduate students and researchers interested in Teichmüller theory and its ramifi cations, in particular for mathematicians working in topology, geometry, algebraic geometry, dynamical systems and complex analysis. European Mathematical Society Publishing House, Seminar for Applied Mathematics, ETH-Zentrum FLI C4 Fliederstrasse 23, CH-8092 Zürich, Switzerland, [email protected], www.ems-ph.org EMS Newsletter March 2009 7 DE GRUYTER New at de Gruyter Andrei Khrennikov (cid:81) Interpretations of Probability 2nd ed. XX, 217 pages. Hardcover. RRP € [D] 129.95 / *US$ 182.00 ISBN 978-3-11-020748-4 to be published January 2009 This is the first fundamental book devoted to non-Kolmogorov probability models. It provides a mathematical theory of negative probabilities, with numerous applications to quantum physics, information theory, complexity, biology and psychology. The book also presents an interesting model of cog- nitive information reality with flows of information probabilities, describing the process of thinking, social, and psychological phenomena. József Lörinczi / Fumio Hiroshima / Volker Betz (cid:81)(cid:3)Feynman-Kac-Type Theorems and Gibbs Measures on Path Space Wiebe R. Pestman With Applications to Rigorous Quantum Field Theory (cid:81)(cid:3)Mathematical Statistics Approx. 380 pages. Hardcover. 2nd ed. Approx. 550 pages. Hardcover. RRP € [D] 88.00 / *US$ 118.00 RRP € [D] 59.95 / * US$ 84.00 ISBN 978-3-11-020148-2 ISBN 978-3-11-020852-8 de Gruyter Studies in Mathematics 34 de Gruyter Textbook to be published February 2009 to be published April 2009 This text offers a reliable and state-of-the-art introduction to the theory and This textbook provides a broad and solid introduction to mathematical statis- method of Feynman-Kac formulas approached from three separate branch- tics, including the classical subjects hypothesis testing, normal regression analy- es. These ideas are developed into a synthesis of applications in mathemati- sis, and normal analysis of variance. In addition, non-parametric statistics and cal physics, principally in models of quantum field theory. Both beginners vectorial statistics are considered, as well as applications of stochastic analysis and experts are addressed, while putting an emphasis on the interdiscipli- in modern statistics, e.g., Kolmogorov-Smirnov testing, smoothing techniques, nary character of the book. robustness and density estimation. New Journal (cid:81) Integers Editors-in-Chief: Melvyn Nathanson / Jaroslav Nešet rˇ il / Carl Pomerance Six issues per year (approximately 400 pages). ISSN (Print) 1867-0652 www.degruyter.com/journals/integers Integers is a refereed journal devoted to research in the area of combinatorial number theory. We welcome original research articles in combinatorics and number theory, with a preference for those that have a con- nection to both fields. Topics covered by the journal include additive number theory, multiplicative number theory, sequences and sets, extremal combinatorics, Ramsey theory, elementary number theory, classical combinatorial problems, hypergraphs, and probabilistic number theory. Integers also houses a combinatorial games section. For eight years, Integers has been successful as an open access journal. This journal is now available at de Gruyter as a print and print+online version. Manuscripts can be submitted electronically to [email protected]. Submissions are reviewed by the highest standards. Subscription Rates for Volume 9 (2009) Editors-in-Chief Associate Managing Editor Print only € 349.00 / *US$ 558.00 Melvyn Nathanson, Lehman College, CUNY, Aaron Robertson,Colgate University, Hamilton, Print + online € 401.00 / *US$ 641.00 Bronx, New York, U.S.A. New York, U.S.A. Jaroslav Nešetřil, Charles University, Prague, Czech Advisory Board Republic Carl Pomerance, Dartmouth College, Hanover, Aviezri Fraenkel, Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel New Hampshire, U.S.A. Imre Ruzsa, Alfréd Rényi Institute of Games Section Editor Mathematics, Budapest, Hungary Richard J. Nowakowski, Dalhousie Herb Wilf, University of Pennsylvania, Philadel- University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada phia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Managing Editor Bruce Landman,University of West Georgia, Car- rollton, Georgia, U.S.A. *for orders places in North America. Prices are subject to change. Prices do not include www.degruyter.com postage and handling.