In The News

(2009) Professor Karen Parshall is the Chair of the Executive Committee for The International Commission for the History of Mathematics. ICHM's web site (which Julie Riddleberger designed) has made the list (#9 - not ranked) of 100 Best Websites for Mathletes. http://www.unizar.es/ichm/home.htm

(2009) Whyburn Instructor, Mike Hill, along with Mike Hopkins and Doug Ravene, has solved a near 50-year-old problem in topology. See the Wikipedia article and the blog. Mike will be speaking at this week's colloquium: On the Non-Existence of Kervaire Invariant One Manifolds.

(2009) Graduate student, Diana Morris, has been awarded the very prestigious Seven Society Graduate Fellowship. The Seven Society Fellowship is unique among teaching awards at the University of Virginia in that nominations come solely from undergraduates, who may only nominate teaching assistants whose classes they have taken. More than 80 nominations were submitted this year. The fellowship, funded through an anonymous bequest to the Seven Society, recognizes a teaching assistant who embodies the highest ideals of teaching at the University: dedication to students, substantial knowledge of the subject matter and skill in conveying passion for that knowledge. Congratulations Diana.

(2009) Graduate student, Katie Quertermous, has been awarded a Dissertation Year Fellowship from the Graduate School. This fellowship will allow Katie to conduct full time research for the academic year 2009-10. Congratulations to Katie.

(2009) Graduate student, Jameson Graber, working on a research project with Irena Lasiecka, has been awarded a graduate research fellowship from the Virginia Space Grant Consortium in support of this endeavor. Congratulations Jameson.

(2009) Graduate student, Katherine Heller, has won the All-University GTA Award. The current A&S Online Magazine has a feature article on Katherine teaching Calculus.

The article mentions that a Mathematics Department GTA has won the All-University GTA Award for the past three years: 2005-06 Michael Smith; 2006-07 Rebecca Schmitz; 2007-08 Lorena Bociu

Congratulations to Katherine on her achievements.

(2009) Graduate students, Ajay Chandra and Diana Morris are finalists for the distinguished Seven Society Fellowship. This award is conducted entirely by undergraduates and the winner will receive a monetary award.

(2009) Lecturer, Daria Snider, has been awarded $20,000 from the Jefferson Trust Board of Trustees to fund a Student Math Study Lounge. We believe this study lounge will provide our students support and positive encouragement in their studies.

(2009) Graduate student, Katherine Heller, has won the Department of Mathematics Teaching Award. Katherine will now compete for the All University Teaching Award. She will receive a monetary award from the Teaching Resource Center and our department.

Honorable mention goes to Nick Hamblet, Rob McEwen, and Katie Quertermous. They, too, will be recognized by our department for their excellent teaching and receive cash awards.

Congratulations to all.

(2008) Graduate student, Lorena Bociu, has been awarded a two-year National Science Foundation International Research Fellowship (NSF-IRF) to carry her research program on nonlinear PDE's at the CMRS (Centre National de la Research Scientifique) Institute Nonlineaire Universite de Nice-Sophia Antipolis (FRANCEF).

(2008) Professor Emeritus Charles Dunkl reports that his biographical profile will appear in the 63rd edition of Marquis Who's Who in America, to be published in Fall '08. MathSciNet now lists 137 papers with his name in the title. More are expected. In April 2009 the program "CIMPA-UNESCO-TUNISIA School on Analytical and Probabilistic Aspects of Dunkl Theory" will be held in Monastir, Tunisia.

The refereed online journal Symmetry, Integrability and Geometry Methods and Applications has scheduled a Special Issue on Dunkl Operators and Related Topics to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Dunkl operators.

(2008) Our team that participated in the William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition was ranked 29, and our student, Wuttisak Trongsiriwat, received an honorable mention for his high score.

(2008) Graduate student, Lorena Bociu, is the winner of the All University Award in Math, Science and Engineering. Honorable Mention Teaching Awards in Mathematics go to Katherine Heller and Takehiko Kaminogo.

(2008) Undergraduate student, Vincent Zimmern, working on a research project with Professor Irina Mitrea and graduate student, Katy Ott, has been awarded a Virginia Space Consortium Grant in support of this endeavor.

(2008) The Association for Women in Mathematics and Cornell University are pleased to announce that Associate Professor Irina Mitrea will receive the second annual Ruth I. Michler Memorial Prize. The Michler Prize is unique-—it grants a mid-career woman in academe a residential fellowship in the Cornell University mathematics department without teaching obligations. This pioneering venture was established through a very generous donation from the Michler family and the efforts of many people at AWM and Cornell. Further details are at: http://www.awm-math.org/michlerprize.html
http://www.awm-math.org/michlerprize.html

(2008) Associate Professor Irina Mitrea is coaching the Sutherland Middle School team in the MathCounts competition. Now in its 25th year, MathCounts is a national math enrichment, coaching and competition program organized by the National Society of Professional Engineers and the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. It is designed to promote interest in mathematics among middle school students across the country.
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(2008) Graduate Student, Lorena Bociu, has won the Mathematics Department Teaching Award. She will compete for the All University Teaching Award. Katherine Heller and Takehiko Kaminogo received honorable mention.

(2008) Graduate Student, Lorena Bociu, has been selected by the VPRGS to represent the University of Virginia at the Virginia Council of Graduate Schools Research Forum in February. The purpose of the forum is to showcase graduate student scholarship across Virginia and to highlight the benefits of graduate education to the Commonwealth. All state universities with graduate programs have been invited to send up to six graduate students to display their scholarship to representatives from thee state legislature, executive branch, the business community, and other Virginia universities.

(2008) Graduate Student, Lorena Bociu, has received the Award for Excellence in Scholarship in the Sciences and Engineering. This award, by the Office of Vice-President for Research and Graduate Studies, recognizes excellence in original scholarship by Ph.D students at the University.

(2008) Professor Weiqiang Wang now serves as the editor of two math journals: International Mathematics Research Notices (IMRN) and International Mathematics Research Papers (IMRP). For the entire Editorial Board of IMRN (and IMRP), see
http://www.oxfordjournals.org/our_journals/imrn/editorial_board.html

(2008) Associate Professor, Slava Kruskal, was awarded a grant from NSF to study New Topological Structures in Condensed Matter Physics at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical physics in Santa Barbara in Spring 2008. Slava will be on leave both Fall (UVa research leave) and Spring (NSF award). When he returns in Fall 2008, he will teach a class on quantum computation.

(2008) Assistant Professor Abdelmalek Abdesselam has been selected as a 2007-08 Excellence in Diversity Fellow which is awarded by Teaching Resource Center.