Maths on the Move

Machine learning and artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence and machines that train themselves might sound like a plot from a science fiction movie, but these things are already part of our everyday lives. How can a machine learn to distinguish a picture of a cat from a picture of a dog?   At the Heidelberg Laureate Forum in 2019, Chris Budd, Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Bath, talked us through the basics of how these learning machines tick.  While Raj Reddy, Turing Award winner and artificial intelligence pioneer, talked to us about his grand challenges in artificial intelligence, and why time travel and immortality might be easier to achieve than creating a machine that rivals human intelligence. To find out more about machine learning, its history, and some of the moral questions it raises, read the series of articles based on Chris' Gresham College lectures.  The music in this podcast is from Oli Freke, and the track is called "Experimental 5". You can find his music at soundcloud. This podcast, first published in August 2020, was partially funded by the European Mathematical Society.  

How the velodrome found its form

To celebrate the Commonwealth Games happening this week in the UK we are visiting one of the venues, the velodrome in the Lee Valley VeloPark in London.  The velodrome, with its striking curved shape, was built for the London 2012 Olympics.  In the run up to the 2012 Olympics, we talked to structural engineers Andrew Weir and Pete Winslow from Expedition Engineering, who were part of the design team for the velodrome, about how mathematics helped create its iconic shape.    Sir Chris Hoy leads the GB Cycling Team during the official opening of the Velodrome (Photograph by David Poultney) We hope you enjoy revisiting this conversation, and you can find out more in this accompanying article. Good luck to all the athletes completing in the 2022 Commonwealth Games!

Maths on the red carpet - Fields Medallist June Huh

June Huh has won one of this year's Fields Medals at the International Congress of Mathematicians. The Fields Medal is one of the most prestigious prizes in mathematics. It is awarded every four years "to recognise outstanding mathematical achievement for existing work and for the promise of future achievement". Up to four mathematicians up to the age of 40 are awarded a Fields Medal each time. June Huh. Photo: Lance Murphey. In this podcast, which comes to you from the opening days of the ICM 2022 in Helsinki, we talk to Huh about is relatively late start in mathematics, about maths you can "feel and touch", and why maths mirrors who we are as a species. You can read about Huh's work in this short introduction and this in-depth article. See here for all our coverage of the prizes awarded at the ICM 2022. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.  

Maths on the red carpet – Fields Medallist Hugo Duminil-Copin

Hugo Duminil-Copin has won a 2022 Fields Medal for his work transforming the mathematical theory of phase transitions in statistical physics. Fields Medals count among the highest honours in mathematics and are awarded every four years at the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) to researchers up to the age of 40. Hugo Duminil-Copin (Photo Matteo Fieni, used with permission) In this podcast, which comes to you from a beautiful lake on day two of the ICM 2022 in Helsinki, we talk to Duminil-Copin about how his work in statistical physics brings together his two loves – maths and physics. You can read about Duminil-Copin's work in this short introduction and this in-depth article. See here for all our coverage of the prizes awarded at the ICM 2022. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.  

Maths on the red carpet - Fields Medallist James Maynard

James Maynard has won a 2022 Fields Medal for "spectacular contributions to number theory". Fields Medals count among the highest honours in mathematics and are awarded every four years at the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) to researchers up to the age of 40. James Maynard (Photo by Ryan Cowan, used with permission) In this podcast, which comes to you from the opening day of the ICM 2022 in Helsinki, we talk to Maynard about his love for numbers and groundbreaking progress towards something that has eluded mathematician for a very long time: a proof of the twin prime conjecture. You can read about Maynard's work in this short introduction and this in-depth article. See here for all our coverage of the prizes awarded at the ICM 2022. And to hear from the other Fields Medallists check out existing and upcoming podcast episodes. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.  

Maths on the red carpet – Fields Medallist Maryna Viazovska

Hello from Helsinki! We are very pleased to be bringing you coverage direct from the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) – one of the highlights of the mathematical calendar. The ICM takes place every four years and it's usually the biggest maths conference of them all, attracting thousands of participants, and also sees the awards of some very prestigious prizes, including the famous Fields Medals. This year's Congress is a little different – it is being held as a fully virtual event with only the prize ceremonies and lectures taking place in-person in Helsinki, Finland on 5 and 6 July. The rest of the schedule fascinating talks from across the spectrum of maths will take place online over the coming week. In this podcast we tell you all the winners of all the prizes being announced today at the ICM and bring you an interview with one of them: Maryna Viazovska, who has won a Fields Medal for a ground-breaking result in the theory of sphere packings. Viazovska is only the second woman to receive a Fields Medal, following on from Maryam Mirzakhani, who won it in 2014. Maryna Viazovska. Photo: Matteo Fieni.   You can find out more about Viazovska's work in our short introduction or our more in-depth article. To read about the work of all the prize winners, see here. And to hear from the other Fields Medallists watch out for upcoming podcast episodes. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.  

Maths on the red carpet –Revisiting the 2018 International Congress of Mathematicians

We are getting very excited - next week is the International Congress of Mathematicians  (ICM)- one of the highlights of the mathematical calendar!  The ICM takes place every four years and it’s the biggest maths conference of them all, attracting thousands of participants, and also sees the awards of some very prestigious prizes, including the famous Fields medal. We are fortunate to have been able to interview the prize winners in advance of the conference, but that’s top secret and we won’t be revealing the winners till they are announced publicly in Helsinki next week!  We're really looking forward to sharing our interviews with you when we meet them in person in Helsinki next week, where we will also bring you all the news from the ICM itself. But in the meantime, to get us in the mood, let's revisit the 2018 ICM that took place in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.  It was a brilliant conference and the podcast you are about to hear was recorded on that very first days of the 2018 ICM, when all the big prizes were announced.  You can find all our coverage of the past three ICM’s by going  to plus.maths.org and searching for "ICM".   And stay tuned for our special series of podcasts, Maths on the Red Carpet, starting next week, that will bring you all our reporting from this years International Congress of Mathematicians.  But for now - enjoy the sounds of the Brazilian forest in this podcast revisiting the exciting first days of the 2018 ICM....

The maths and magic of shuffling

We all have our favoured methods of shuffling cards, but most of us don't think any more about it once we've started playing a game. But there's so much more to be discovered! In this podcast mathematician Cheryl Praeger and magician Will Houstoun reveal the maths and magic behind shuffling cards. And as this podcast, first published in March 2021, was the first podcast we produced in collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute, Dan Aspel also tells us all about the INI! You can watch Cheryl Praeger talk about the mathematics of shuffling in her Kirk Lecture at the INI in 2020. You can be astounded by Will Houstoun's magic, including the amazing trick we mentioned in the podcast, and find out more about his work as magician in residence at the Imperial College London and Royal College of Music Centre for Performance Science, at his website. And you can read all the details behind the maths and magic of shuffling in their Plus articles: The magic of shuffling and The mathematics of shuffling. This podcast was inspired by a talk given by Cheryl Praeger as part of the Groups, representations and applications programme at the Isaac Newton Institute. You can find out more about the maths behind this programme here.

Living Proof: Anita Layton – one of Canada’s most powerful women

In this episode we meet the irrepressible Anita Layton. As well as leading a busy research team, Anita also spends much of her downtime fostering diversity and mentorships throughout her networks, and is professionally engaged across disciplines as distinct as applied mathematics, computer science and the medical sciences. She was also voted one of 2021’s top 100 “Canada’s most powerful women”.   We are very pleased to host this episode of the Living Proof podcast as part of our collaboration with the wonderful  Isaac Newton Institute.  Plus editor, Marianne Freiberger,  joined the INI's Dan Aspel to interview the irrepressible Prof Anita Layton of the University of Waterloo, when she was a guest at INI for a week-long workshop on kinetic theory.  You can find out more about this fascinating area of maths on Plus. Thank you to Dan and the INI for allowing us to host this episode of Living Proof on our podcast.   You can find all the content from our collaboration with the INI here. 00:00 – Introduction 00:58 – Welcome 01:50 – Attending the “Frontiers in kinetic equations for plasmas and collective behaviour” workshop 06:44 – How do you stay on top of multiple fields? (“I don’t always understand every single slide in a talk!”) 12:50 – Fostering diversity in the sciences, connecting mentorships between different generations of female mathematicians 17:30 – Mathematics for “social good”? (“It excites me to do something that has meaning, that is impactful”) 19:16 – A personal history in the sciences, “I told you I don’t have a math degree. Let me tell you why…” 24:00 – Connecting kinetic theory, kidneys, blood flow and more

On the mathematical frontline: Matt Keeling

"We all work with exponential growth and we're really, really used to it, but we are still amazed at how fast things take off at the end." This is epidemiologist Matt Keeling talking about how a disease outbreak can still take you by surprise even if you've been working in the field for 25 years. Matt's team at the University of Warwick has been running one of the main models that have informed UK government on the COVID-19 pandemic. In this podcast Matt tells us about his work on the roadmap out of lockdown, whether the models have been too pessimistic, and what it's been like producing scientific results that carry so much weight. This episode is part of On the mathematical frontline, a special series of the Plus podcast which explores the work of mathematicians grappling with the unprecedented challenge of studying a live pandemic unfolding in front of their eyes.    In this series we interview our colleagues in the JUNIPER modelling consortium, whose research and insights have fed into the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Modelling group (otherwise known as SPI-M) and the now familiar SAGE - the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies , both of whom advise the UK government on the scientific aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic. To find out more about the work of Matt's team on the roadmap out of lockdown, see this article. You can see all of our content related to JUNIPER here.