Workshop on Connecting Isolated Mathematical Researchers

For access to the workshop and related activities, please register by filling in this form. (Please do not fill in the form again if you registered for the first two days.)

If you have any questions, please e-mail R.Halburd@ucl.ac.uk.

Join the conversation

This workshop will primarily be a discussion about issues affecting mathematicians working in places in which there are limited opportunities to interact with other researchers and the international community at large. In particular the three days of this (first?) worksop will concentrate on mathematicians and mathematical scientists working in low and middle income countries but it is open to all.

This workshop will not be a place to present mathematics but it will be a place to discuss the problems facing mathematical researchers working largely in isolation because, e.g., there is no critical mass of other researchers to which they have access or there are limited opportunities to engage in international activities such as conferences and workshops. It will be a chance to hear about the issues researchers are facing, some of which might be fairly universal and some of which will be country or region specific. We will also spend a lot of time discussing possible ways in which we can work together to tackle some of these issues. It is important that we consider possible actions before committing to any of them as everyone's time is very limited so we should consider carefully how to use it.

Each of the three days of the workshop will have two hours of activities with a short break in between. During the first hour we will hear from the members of a panel who will discuss individual experiences or some of the issues facing mathematicians in their country or region. The second hour will be an open discussion involving any interested participants and the panel. I plan to send out a summary of the discussion each day. I also plan to make the conclusions of the discussion available to interested people in the wider mathematical community and I envision a second much larger workshop advertised widely to the international mathematical community. At the very least, this will be a first step in creating a truly global community of mathematicians (and related mathematical scientists) interested in tackling this problem.

Panel members will include