The unity of mathematics: A conference in honour of Sir Michael Atiyah

Workshop theme

> Join us on Twitter | Facebook | Instagram
Event hashtag: #NewtonAtiyah2021

Sir Michael Atiyah (1929-2019) was the dominant figure in UK mathematics for many decades.  Amongst his many distinguished positions, he was the founding Director of the Isaac Newton Institute (1990-96). He was also President of the London Mathematical Society (1974 -76). In his Presidential Address “The Unity of Mathematics”,  delivered on November 19th, 1976,  he remarked:   “The aspect of mathematics which fascinates me most is the rich interaction between its different branches, the unexpected links, the surprises…”. Those who knew him will know that this fascination was an ongoing theme throughout his life.

The London Mathematical Society spearheaded the idea of a meeting of the same title to celebrate Sir Michael’s immense contributions to mathematics and the mathematical life of this country.  It is being organised jointly with the Isaac Newton Institute and has been made possible owing to the generosity of the LMS and the INI, in partnership with the Heilbronn Institute for Mathematical Research, the Clay Mathematical Institute and the Mathematical Institute, Oxford.

The conference will consist of a selection of talks which we trust Sir Michael would have found interesting and which reflect the interactions which he so much appreciated.  The speakers cover a broad range of mathematical generations and topics, ranging from number theory to theoretical physics, and include representatives from Oxford, Cambridge, Bonn, Princeton and Edinburgh – places which played a fundamental role at various stages of Sir Michael’s long mathematical life. The presentations should be accessible to a broad audience.

Due to current COVID restrictions in the UK, it is not possible to hold a fully face-to-face meeting. It is the intention of the Organisers that the event will take place as a hybrid event, with both face-to-face and online participants.   However, please note that if there are any further changes to the COVID restrictions in the UK in September, the event may have to be run as a fully virtual meeting. The situation will be reviewed regularly.

All speakers will be online with the exception of Nigel Hitchin, Minhyong Kim, Oscar Randal-Williams, Bernd Schroers and Ulrike Tillmann.

The following organisers and members of the Scientific Committee will be attending the conference online only: Simon Donaldson,  Lisa Jeffrey, José Figueroa-O’Farrill, Laura Schaposnik and Henry Wilton.   In addition to the above list, over 150 further people have registered to participate in the Conference online.

Registration is closed for physical participants.   Registration is open for virtual participants only. 

Apply Now

Speakers:

• Robbert Dijkgraaf (IAS) - 'Atiyah’s Dream: The Geometry of Quantum Physics'
• Nigel Higson (Penn State) - 'Index theory and noncommutative geometry'
• Nina Holden (ETH) - 'Liouville quantum gravity in probability theory'
• Minhyong Kim (Warwick/Edinburgh/Heriot Watt) - 'Index theory and gauge theory in arithmetic                                                                                                            geometry'
• Rahul Pandharipande (ETH) - 'Torus actions on moduli spaces after Atiyah and Bott'
• Lisa Piccirillo (MIT) - 'Knot concordance and 4-manifolds'
• Oscar Randal-Williams (Cambridge) - 'Spaces of positive scalar curvature metrics'
• Peter Sarnak (Princeton) -0' The algebraic and transcendental parts of the spectra of arithmetic manifolds'
• Bernd Schroers (Heriot Watt) - 'Michael Atiyah and Physics: the Edinburgh Years'
• Nick Sheridan (Edinburgh) - 'Quantum cohomology as a deformation of symplectic cohomology'
• Catharina Stroppel (Bonn)
• Maryna Viazovska (EPFL)
• Edward Witten (IAS) - 'Duality, the Langlands Correspondence, and the Influence of Michael Atiyah'

Scientific Committee:

• Nigel Hitchin (Oxford, Chair) 
• Simon Donaldson (Stony Brook)
• Dai Evans (Cardiff and LMS Council)
• Lisa Jeffrey (Toronto)
• Jon Keating (Oxford and LMS President)
• Ivan Smith (Cambridge)
• Richard Thomas (Imperial)