Vladimir Arnold

68 Pages·2010·6.27 MB·English

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
Interviews Obituary Feature Centres
Fields Medallists Vladimir Arnold Loewner’s Differential Eq. Matheon
p. 15 p. 28 p. 31 p. 50
December 2010
Issue 78
ISSN 1027-488X
SS EE European
MM MM Mathematical
EE SS Society
1
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Contents
Editorial Team European
Editor-in-Chief Jorge Buescu
(Book Reviews) Mathematical
Vicente Muñoz Dep. Matemática, Faculdade
Facultad de Matematicas de Ciências, Edifício C6,
Universidad Complutense Piso 2 Campo Grande
de Madrid 1749-006 Lisboa, Portugal Society
Plaza de Ciencias 3, e-mail: [email protected]
28040 Madrid, Spain
Dmitry Feichtner-Kozlov
e-mail: [email protected] (Personal Column)
FB3 Mathematik
University of Bremen
Associate Editors
Postfach 330440 Newsletter No. 78, December 2010
D-28334 Bremen, Germany
Vasile Berinde
Department of Mathematics e -mail: [email protected]
and Computer Science Eva Miranda EMS Agenda ..................................................................................................................................................... 2
Universitatea de Nord Departament de Matemàtica
Baia Mare Aplicada I Editorial – A. Laptev ............................................................................................................................... 3
Facultatea de Stiinte EPSEB, Edifici P
Farewell from EMS Vice-Presidents – P. Exner & H. Holden 4
Str. Victoriei, nr. 76 Universitat Politècnica .............
430072, Baia Mare, Romania de Catalunya EMS EC and Council Meeting in Sofia – V. Berinde 7
......................................
e-mail: [email protected] Av. del Dr Maran˜on 44–50
08028 Barcelona, Spain CIMPA-ICPAM: a European Outlook 9
Krzysztof Ciesielski ...................................................................................
(Societies) e-mail: [email protected]
The ICM 2010 in Hyderabad (India) – U. Persson 11
Mathematics Institute Mădălina Păcurar ............................................
Jagiellonian University (Book Reviews) Interviews with Fields Medallists – U. Persson 15
....................................................
Łojasiewicza 6 Department of Statistics,
PL-30-348, Kraków, Poland Forecast and Mathematics Elon Lindenstrauss .............................................................................................................................. 15
e-mail: [email protected] Babes ,-Bolyai University
Ngô Bao Châu 18
Martin Raussen T. Mihaili St. 58–60 ............................................................................................................................................
Department of Mathematical 400591 Cluj-Napoca, Romania Stanislav Smirnov 19
..................................................................................................................................
Sciences e-mail: [email protected];
Aalborg University e-mail: [email protected] Cédric Villani 23
................................................................................................................................................
Fredrik Bajers Vej 7G
Frédéric Paugam
DK-9220 Aalborg Øst, Institut de Mathématiques Vladimir Arnold – S. M. Gusein-Zade & A. N. Varchenko ...................... 28
Denmark
de Jussieu
The Evolution of Loewner’s Differential Equations –
e-mail: [email protected] 175, rue de Chevaleret
Robin Wilson F-75013 Paris, France M. Abate, F. Bracci, M. D. Contreras & S. Díaz-Madrigal 31
...............
Department of Mathematical e-mail: [email protected]
Sciences The Lvov School of Mathematics – R. Duda ........................................................... 40
The Open University Ulf Persson
Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, UK Matematiska Vetenskaper Centres: Matheon ......................................................................................................................................... 50
Chalmers tekniska högskola
e-mail: [email protected] ICMI Column – M. Bartolini Bussi 55
S-412 96 Göteborg, Sweden .........................................................................................
e-mail: [email protected] Zentralblatt Column: Dynamic Reviewing – B. Wegner 57
Copy Editor ............................
Themistocles M. Rassias
Book Reviews 59
(Problem Corner) ..................................................................................................................................................
Chris Nunn
Department of Mathematics
4 Rosehip Way, Lychpit Personal Column – D. Feichtner-Kozlov 64
National Technical University .......................................................................
Basingstoke RG24 8SW, UK
of Athens
e-mail: [email protected]
Zografou Campus
GR-15780 Athens, Greece
Editors e-mail: [email protected]. The views expressed in this Newsletter are those of the
Erhard Scholz authors and do not necessarily represent those of the
Mariolina Bartolini Bussi
(History)
(Math. Education) EMS or the Editorial Team.
University Wuppertal
Dip. Matematica – Universitá
Department C, Mathematics, ISSN 1027-488X
Via G. Campi 213/b
and Interdisciplinary Center
I-41100 Modena, Italy © 2010 European Mathematical Society
for Science and Technology
e-mail: [email protected] Studies (IZWT), Published by the
42907 Wuppertal, Germany EMS Publishing House
Chris Budd
e-mail: [email protected] ETH-Zentrum FLI C4
Department of Mathematical
CH-8092 Zürich, Switzerland.
Sciences, University of Bath Olaf Teschke
Bath BA2 7AY, UK (Zentralblatt Column) homepage: www.ems-ph.org
Franklinstraße 11
e-mail: [email protected]
D-10587 Berlin, Germany For advertisements contact: [email protected]
e-mail: [email protected]
EMS Newsletter December 2010 1
EMS News
EMS Executive Committee EMS Agenda
President Ordinary Members 2010
Prof. Ari Laptev Prof. Zvi Artstein 2 December
(2007–10) Department of Mathematics Final Conference of the Forward Look “Mathematics and
Department of Mathematics The Weizmann Institute of Industry”, Bruxelles
South Kensington Campus Science http://www.ceremade.dauphine.fr/FLMI/FLMI-frames-index.html
Imperial College London Rehovot, Israel
SW7 2AZ London, UK e-mail: [email protected] 2011
e-mail: [email protected]
Prof. Franco Brezzi
and 9–13 February
Istituto di Matematica Applicata
Department of Mathematics 5th World Conference on 21st Century Mathematics 2011
e Tecnologie Informatiche del
Royal Institute of Technology Lahore, Pakistan
C.N.R.
SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden http://wc2011.sms.edu.pk
via Ferrata 3
e-mail: [email protected]
27100, Pavia, Italy
19–20 March
e-mail: [email protected]
EMS Executive Committee Meeting
Vice-Presidents
Prof. Mireille Martin- Weierstrass Institute, Berlin
Deschamps Contact: [email protected]
Prof. Pavel Exner
(2007–10)
(2005–10)
Département de 30 March–3 April
Department of Theoretical
mathématiques EUROMATH-European Student Conference in Mathematics
Physics, NPI
Bâtiment Fermat Athens, Greece
Academy of Sciences
45, avenue des Etats-Unis www.euromath.org
25068 Rez – Prague
F-78030 Versailles Cedex,
Czech Republic
France 7–8 May
e-mail: [email protected]
e-mail: [email protected] EMS Meeting of Presidents of Mathematical Societies in
Prof. Helge Holden Europe, Spain (exact location to be fixed)
Prof. Igor Krichever
(2007–10)
Department of Mathematics
Department of Mathematical 18–22 July
Columbia University
Sciences ICIAM 2011 Congress, Vancouver, Canada
2990 Broadway
Norwegian University of www.iciam2011.com
New York, NY 10027, USA
Science and Technology
and
Alfred Getz vei 1 3–8 July
Landau Institute of Theoretical
NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway Third European Set Theory Conference, ESF-EMS-ERCOM
Physics
e-mail: [email protected] Russian Academy of Sciences Conference, Edinburgh, United Kingdom
http://www.esf.org/activities/esf-conferences/details/2011/
Moscow
confdetail368.html
e-mail: [email protected]
Secretary
Dr. Martin Raussen 3–8 July
Dr. Stephen Huggett Department of Mathematical Completely Integrable Systems and Applications,
(2007–10) Sciences, Aalborg University ESF-EMS-ERCOM Conference
School of Mathematics Fredrik Bajers Vej 7G Vienna, Austria
and Statistics DK-9220 Aalborg Øst,
University of Plymouth Denmark 2012
Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK e-mail: [email protected]
30 June–1 July
e-mail: [email protected]
EMS Secretariat Council Meeting of European Mathematical Society,
Kraków, Poland
Treasurer
Ms. Terhi Hautala www.euro-math-soc.eu
Department of Mathematics
Prof. Jouko Väänänen and Statistics 2–7 July
(2007–10) P.O. Box 68 6th European Mathematical Congress, Kraków, Poland
Department of Mathematics (Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2b) www.euro-math-soc.eu
and Statistics FI-00014 University of Helsinki
Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2b Finland
FIN-00014 University of Helsinki Tel: [phone]
Finland Fax: [phone]
e-mail: [email protected] e-mail: [email protected]
and Web site: http://www.euro-math-soc.eu
Institute for Logic, Language
and Computation EMS Publicity Officer
University of Amsterdam
Plantage Muidergracht 24 Prof. Vasile Berinde
1018 TV Amsterdam Department of Mathematics
The Netherlands and Computer Science
e-mail: [email protected] North University of Baia Mare
430122 Baia Mare, Romania
e-mail: [email protected]
2 EMS Newsletter December 2010
Editorial
Editorial tant it is to be persistent when applying for funds and not
to be deterred or discouraged by continuous rejection.
One of the biggest success stories has been the 2 year
ESF-EMS Forward Look project “Math&Industry”. On
2 December 2010, there will be a final, very highly repre-
EMS now and in the future sentative conference for this project in Brussels. One of
the recommendations for the final text of the project in-
Ari Laptev, President of the EMS cludes the creation of a European Institute of Mathemati-
cal Sciences and Innovation. The project Math&Industry
It has been a great honour and pleasure has been led by the EMS Applied Mathematics Commit-
for me to serve the European mathemati- tee, chaired by M. Primicerio, and the committee, togeth-
cal community as President of the Euro- er with the ESF, are now deeply involved in preparing an
pean Mathematical Society over the last application for an EU Design Study e-infrastructure.
four years. My thanks to all the members Congratulations also go to our “Raising Public
of the EMS Executive Committee and to the active Awareness of Mathematics” Committee, chaired by E.
members of national mathematical societies. Behrends. This committee has succeeded in receiving
Over these last few years, we have seen the EMS funds from the insurance company Munich-Re. Such
move forward in very many ways but especially in unit- funds will allow the committee to substantially increase
ing our forces to convince policymakers of the impor- its impact on promoting mathematics in Europe through
tance of mathematical sciences for Europe. a large number of interesting projects.
We have always kept in mind that one of the main The EMS Developing Countries Committee has al-
missions of the EMS is to promote mathematics in Eu- ways been one of our most successful committees. The
rope and to provide a link between European institu- committee has received substantial donations from in-
tions and national mathematical societies. In order to dividual sponsors, which have enabled the committee to
achieve this, the EMS Executive Committee has encour- give financial support to mathematicians from develop-
aged a closer contact with and between the societies. ing countries to attend European conferences.
One very successful result of this development has been Recently we were able to rebuild our Education
the establishing of annual meetings of the presidents of Committee. Chaired by G. Törner, we now hope that this
the national mathematical societies. These meetings give committee will be able to provide a fruitful link between
the participants the opportunity to discuss informally the community of mathematicians involved in problems
and provide important feedback for the Executive Com- of education in mathematics and university professors.
mittee members, as well as encouraging a feeling of unity The committee “Women and Mathematics” is ex-
between European mathematicians. tremely active in promoting mathematics among young
A recent example of the latter has been the enormous female students and mathematicians and has particular
response from numerous European mathematical socie- support from the EMS Executive Committee.
ties to the devastating news that the Erwin Schrödinger The EMS Meeting Committee, responsible for or-
Institute has been threatened with closure, as from 1 Jan- ganising European conferences, mathematical weekends,
uary 2011. Many presidents on behalf of their societies, etc, is very active now and I am sure that it will contribute
as well as individuals, have written letters of support to substantially to the visibility of EMS.
the Austrian Ministry. The EMS has finally built a new Ethics Committee,
Now (8 November), we have received information chaired by A. Jensen. It had its first meeting recently in
that the ESI funding will be secured during 2011. I would Oberwolfach. We all feel that it is time for the EMS to
like to express my gratitude to all those whose commit- have such a committee, which at present will be involved
ment and belief have undoubtedly contributed to the in ethical problems related to plagiarism and the unethi-
Austrian Government reconsidering its decision. cal behaviour of some of our colleagues. Regrettably this
We are now actively involved in various European still exists within our community.
projects. Among them is the ESF-EMS-ERCOM se- The EMS Publishing House, organised by the former
ries of conferences. The ESF office in Brussels provides EMS President Rolf Jeltsch, is developing very well.
matching funds of up to € 20,000 for organising confer- During the last few years it has substantially increased
ences at ERCOM centres. Some of these centres have its portfolio of mathematical journals. It now has a large
found it difficult to fulfil the requirements of the ESF. number of different book series and enjoys financial se-
However, as a result of a meeting between the EMS, the curity. For its success we are obliged to the professional-
ESF and ERCOM on 17 September, many of these re- ism of its director T. Hintermann and his colleague M.
quirements have been cancelled. We now hope that this Karbe. We now conclude that they have been able to
series of conferences will become even more successful build up a truly non-commercial publishing house with a
and popular. very high reputation.
I would like to congratulate our Electronic Publish- The EMS Newsletter continues to make most inter-
ing Committee on finally receiving a very substantial EU esting reading and we are all very grateful to M. Raussen
grant for the European Digital Mathematical Library, af- and lately to V. Muñoz and the members of the Newslet-
ter many unsuccessful attempts. This confirms how impor- ter Editorial Board for their devoted work.
EMS Newsletter December 2010 3
Editorial
The major task for the EMS is the organisation of the the failure of the EU infrastructure application MATH-
EMS congresses. We are grateful to our Dutch colleagues EI last year. We had great hopes for this project. Its aim
for organising the 5th European Congress of Mathemat- was to build a European mathematics infrastructure that
ics in Amsterdam in 2002. The next congress will be in would be able to finance conferences, workshops, schools
Kraków and the 6ECM Prize and Programme Committees research visits and programmes. Next year, there will be
have already been put together. After some negotiation another EU call of this kind and we feel that it is our duty
with Springer it has been agreed that there will be a new to try once again.
EMS-Springer History Prize. Springer has now resolved to We also have to admit that we failed in attracting
support this prize with € 5,000 every four years. It is impor- more new EMS individual members, despite all our ef-
tant to mention the collaboration between the EMS and forts. However, we did succeed in attracting new society
Springer in the future development of Zentralblatt. This members. Among them are mathematical societies from
is a very important project for the EMS and our dream is Serbia, Montenegro and Turkey. Looking at the map of
now to make Zentralblatt free of charge for all European Europe on our new and very attractive EMS webpage
Countries. So far, we have only succeeded in making it free we see almost no red spots left. This reflects the fact that
for individual EMS members and for a large number of mathematical societies from almost all European coun-
developing countries. Every EMS individual member is tries are members of the EMS.
entitled to obtain their own login password for ZMATH. In conclusion I would like to thank all the Executive
Another joint project between the EMS and Springer Committee members for their hard work and for the
concerns an encyclopedia of mathematics that was origi- warm and friendly atmosphere we had during our meet-
nally published in Russia and later translated and pub- ings. It has been a challenging, exhausting but wonderful
lished by Springer. The EMS and Springer have recently experience for me.
signed a contract according to which the text of this ency- I am confident that the next EMS President Marta
clopedia will be digitised by Springer and made available Sanz-Solé and the members of the EMS Executive Com-
on the internet, free of charge, with a comment facility mittee will continue to strengthen the EMS, making it
(as a wiki-part). The EMS Electronic Publishing Com- more influential and more useful for the members of the
mittee will be responsible for running this webpage. European mathematical community. I wish the new team
Unfortunately not everything we planned was success- every success in generating new ideas that will further
ful. Most painful for the EMS (and especially for me) was promote our beautiful subject in Europe.
Looking back – and forward
Our lives and careers While the EC composition and the style of its meet-
have natural periods ings kept changing, it was always an efficiently work-
and it is useful to stop ing body, both face to face, when we met 2–3 times a
briefly and reflect at the year at various places of Europe, and in electronic ex-
end of each of them. changes, often with everyday frequency. I am sure that
One such moment this will remain true in the future. In fact, Marta Sanz-
comes for me now that Solé was an EC member when I joined and I am glad
my eight years of service to see her back and at the helm of the EMS six years
on the EMS Executive later. I wish her and her fellow EC members success in
Committee (EC) are their work.
coming to a conclusion. This is not a place for a detailed overview of my work
I was elected to the EC in the EC, some of which I am proud of while other parts
at the council meeting in the rear mirror could have definitely been done bet-
in Oslo in 2002 and two ter. I restrict myself to a single thing, which is my work
years later in Uppsala I in the ERC Scientific Council. It originated in the EMS
was promoted to Vice- because I was selected as its member based on a nomina-
Pavel Exner President and served as tion of the EMS Executive Committee.
such for six years under I wrote an account about ERC activities and its im-
the presidency of John Kingman and Ari Laptev. I want pact on mathematics recently in the newsletter and I am
to thank them, as well as my fellow Vice-Presidents Luc not going to repeat myself; rather, I want to reflect on
Lemaire and Helge Holden, the other officers, EC mem- the ERC from a more general perspective. I must con-
bers and collaborators for the privilege and pleasure of fess that I entered the Scientific Council with hesitation.
working with them. We are used to communicating with our own brand or
4 EMS Newsletter December 2010
EMS News
our close neighbours and it was not clear to me how that such a goal can be achieved only if we act in collab-
a dialogue would look like in a company covering the oration with our peers in other disciplines in the inter-
whole science spectrum, from mathematics to medicine, ests of high-level science and with the broad support of
art history, etc. It was remarkable how fast we found a the scientific community. Let me express the hope that
common language; it became immediately clear that we will be able to do that and that Europe will preserve
there is a notion of “excellent science” common to all and strengthen its role as a birthplace of great scientific
of us. ideas.
I think in the past few years European science has
made great progress and that it has to go on at the set Pavel Exner
pace if we should not lose out in the ever intensifying EMS Vice-President and an
global competition. The lesson we have to remember is ERC Scientific Council Member
The EMS – providing a
European identity
It is not unusual for ex- ing stability and activity. Other societies are big and fi-
ecutives, when stepping nancially very solid. To compensate for this substantial
down, to polish the ac- diversity, it is important to be able to become an active
complishments during individual member of the EMS.
their tenure while at the We now have better visibility on the web. The web de-
same time offering ad- velops very dynamically, unpredictably and very fast. To
vice for their successors. keep up with this development is not easy, and is made
I will try to avoid that. I more difficult by our limited financial resources. But it is
have been Secretary for necessary to have high visibility on the web, in order to
4 years followed by a increase membership in particular. We have to compen-
4-year term as Vice-Pres- sate for our lack of financial resources by appealing to
ident. Preceded by one the creativity, voluntary work and inventiveness of our
year as a “trainee”, this members.
means that I have been The EMS is more important than ever before. To cre-
affiliated with the EMS ate a European identity in mathematical sciences is vi-
for close to half its life- tal. In particular, it is crucial to promote the importance
Helge Holden time. It has been a very of mathematics to the EU and its funding bodies. To be
Picture from abelprisen.no/en interesting experience. successful we have to speak with one voice and only the
The main challenge EMS has the legitimacy to act on behalf of European
during my tenure, as it will be for the future officers of mathematics.
the EMS, is to increase membership. The EMS has a I have always insisted that we should elect our officers
special membership structure, distinct from most other with definite terms and with a maximum length of term
transnational societies. We have both individual mem- of office. With approximately 500 million people living
bers and society members. This reflects the special Euro- in the realm of the European Mathematical Society, it is
pean structure with many nations, many more different important to have a regular turnover and let new people
languages and quite substantial cultural diversity. This serve the EMS. Now my time has come and I am happy
construction was the result of a compromise at the time to see the new Executive Committee and its incoming
when the EMS was established. There are close to no officers, and I am convinced that they will be able to de-
white spots on the European map when it comes to soci- velop the EMS further.
ety members. Except for Albania, we cover an extended
Europe. However, when it comes to individual members, Helge Holden
the map contains many white areas. It is not good enough Vice-President of the EMS
to have individual membership around 2500. During my
tenure we have tried to increase membership, not too
successfully, and the new Executive Committee will have
to continue the work and try to do better. I am in favour
of the dual membership structure. Many of the national
societies are weak, certainly financially but also regard-
EMS Newsletter December 2010 5
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EMS News
EMS Executive Committee and Council
meetings in Sofia, 9–11 July 2010
Vasile Berinde, EMS Publicity Officer
According to Article 5 of the EMS Statutes, the Council mittee: Eduard Feireisl; Prizes Committee: Frances Kir-
meets “at least once every two years not earlier than May wan; Felix Klein Prize Committee: Wil Schilders; and His-
and not later than October”. So, after its previous regular tory of Mathematics Prize Committee: Jeremy Gray) and,
meetings of the current decade, all located in western Eu- except for the Programme Committee, all are complete.
ropean countries: Barcelona (2000), Oslo (2002), Uppsala Another important item concerning Scientific Meetings
(2004) and Utrecht (2006), the EMS moved towards south- has been the question of appointing a new Chair of the
eastern Europe for its 2010 Council Meeting, in Sofia, at Meetings Committee, because the Chair had just offered
the invitation of the Union of Bulgarian Mathematicians. his resignation. Zvi Artstein has been appointed as an in-
Being, as a rule, preceded by the Executive Meeting (9–10 terim Chair for this committee until the end of 2011.
July), this time the Council Meeting (10–11 July) was also After the Executive Committee had gone through
accompanied by two associated events: the Round Table the agenda for the Council item by item, checking that
“20th anniversary of EMS” (10 July) and the conference the papers and presentations were in order, the reports
“Mathematics in Industry” (11–14 July). All these events from the standing committees were presented. For this
were hosted by the Metropolitan Hotel in Sofia, an excel- part of the meeting, Ehrhard Behrends, Dusanka Perisic
lent location and perhaps the best Council meeting loca- and Qendrim Gashi were invited to join the meeting. The
tion amongst the ones mentioned above. We shall briefly present Committee Chairs, i.e. Mario Primicerio (Applied
report here on the first three EMS events held in Sofia. Mathematics), Dusanka Perisic (Women and Mathemat-
ics) and Ehrhard Behrends (Raising Public Awareness)
EC Meeting gave reports on the activity of their committees, while
Present were the EC members Ari Laptev (President and Mireille Martin-Deschamps (Developing Countries),
Chair), Pavel Exner and Helge Holden (Vice-Presidents), Igor Krichever (Eastern Europe), Franco Brezzi (Educa-
Stephen Huggett (Secretary), Jouko Väänänen (Treasur- tion) and Pavel Exner (Electronic Publishing), reported
er), Zvi Artstein, Franco Brezzi, Igor Krichever, Mireille on behalf of the Chair of the respective committees. Ari
Martin-Deschamps and Martin Raussen and, by invitation, Laptev gave a brief report on the Meetings Committee
Marta Sanz-Solé, Terhi Hautala and Riitta Ulmanen (Hel- and reported that the Ethics Committee had now been set
sinki EMS Secretariat), Vicente Muñoz (Editor-in-Chief of up and that its first meeting would be in Oberwolfach in
the EMS Newsletter), Mario Primicerio (Chair of the EMS September 2010.
Committee for Applied Mathematics) and Vasile Berinde. In In the last part of the meeting, Mario Primicerio re-
the beginning, as the Sofia meeting would be her last EC ported on the EMS Summer Schools that would be organ-
meeting, the President thanked Riitta Ulmanen very much ised this year and Vicente Muñoz gave his healthy report
for her work at the Helsinki EMS Secretariat in the period on the newsletter while Susan Oakes, specifically invited
2006–2010. Following the agenda, brief reports by the offic- to the meeting, gave a brief report on her work so far in
ers (President, Treasurer, Secretary, Vice-President Helge improving the take-up of individual membership through
Holden and Publicity Officer) were given. Then, it was the national societies.
agreed that the application of the Mathematical Society of The next Executive Committee meeting was held in
the Republic of Moldova to be a member of EMS should Lausanne, at the invitation of the Swiss Mathematical So-
be considered by the current Council meeting, while the ciety, on 13–14 November 2010.
one by Kosovar Mathematical Society (to whom Dr Qën-
drim Gashi gave a short presentation describing the history
and structure in the second part of the meeting) would have
to wait until the next Council meeting. An important issue
was related to the reduced individual membership fee for
people from developing countries with the following res-
olution after discussions: the EC would set a fee and the
EMS Committee for Developing Countries would set eli-
gibility criteria of both a country and an individual but the
individual members paying a reduced fee would not receive
the printed copy of the newsletter. Working atmosphere during the EC meeting in Sofia (from the left to
the right): A. Laptev, S. Huggett, Z. Artstein, M. Raussen, M. Sanz-
In connection with the preparations for the next Eu-
Solé, M. Martin-Deschamps, H. Holden, T. Hautala, R. Ulmanen and
ropean Congress of Mathematics, it was reported that all
E. Behrends. Susan Oakes, from the opposite side, can be seen in the
committees for 6ECM have a Chair (Programme Com- mirror.
EMS Newsletter December 2010 7
EMS News
During the Council meeting. First row to the right: Olga Gil-Medrano and Stefan Dodunekov.
Council Meeting To close the Council, the President thanked the local or-
In the afternoon of 10 July, 58 delegates of EMS members ganisers, Stefan Dodunekov and his team, for the excel-
were present and so the quorum of the Council, which lent organisation of this Council and announced the next
requires two-fifths of its total number of delegates, was meetings. So, the next meeting of Presidents would be in
easily satisfied. Also in attendance were several invitees, Spain in April or May 2011, at the invitation of the Real
alongside Terhi Hautala and Riita Ulmanen from EMS Sociedad Matemática Española, while the next Council
Helsinki Secretariat. The meeting was opened by the meeting would be on 30 June–1 July 2012 in Kraków, in
President who welcomed the delegates and expressed his conjunction with the 6th European Congress of Math-
thanks and very warm gratitude to the local hosts. ematics (6ECM).
After the detailed reports of the President, Executive
Committee and Finance, the Council approved the re- 20th anniversary of EMS
quest from the London Mathematical Society to change As at the end of this year EMS will celebrate the 20th an-
from class 3 to class 4. Mitrofan Cioban, President of the niversary of its foundation on 28 October 1990 (in Madra-
Mathematical Society of the Republic of Moldova, then lin, Poland), this important event was marked a little in
gave a short presentation in support of the application to advance during the EMS Council meeting in Sofia, on the
join the EMS, which was approved by the Council. The afternoon of 10 July, by means of the two hours Round Ta-
next important issue of the first part of the meeting was ble “The 20th anniversary of EMS” to which were invited all
the Elections to Executive Committee. There were five Council delegates. This consisted of some historical presen-
vacant officer positions, left open by the ending of the tations and speeches by Jean-Pierre Bourguignon and Rolf
terms of the President, the two Vice-Presidents, the Sec- Jeltsch (former EMS Presidents), Ari Laptev (current EMS
retary and Treasurer and two of the ordinary members. President) and M. Sanz-Solé (EMS President elect), David
The Executive Committee had one nomination for each Salinger (former Publicity Officer), Tuulikki Makelainen
position and no nominations were made on the floor for from the EMS Helsinki Secretariat (1990–2006) and Vasile
the vacant officer positions. Marta Sanz-Solé was elected Berinde. David Salinger’s presentation “EMS history (2000–
as President and Mireille Martin-Deschamps and Martin 2005)” included many personal remembrances around some
Raussen as Vice-Presidents, while Jouko Väänänen and pictures taken from various EMS events during his term of
Stephen Huggett were re-elected as Treasurer and Secre- office, while the presentation “EMS history by pictures” by
tary, respectively. There were six nominations for the two Tuulikki Makelainen and Vasile Berinde proposed an 88
vacant Member-at-Large seats. As Vasile Berinde took 20 slide tour with pictures from the main locations of the EMS
votes, Rui Loja Fernandes 26, Ignacio Luengo 7, Volker meetings, extracted from the EMS pictures archive located
Mehrmann 37 and Jiří Rákosník 20, Rui Loja Fernandes at http://vberinde.ubm.ro/?m=ems/european-mathematical-
and Volker Mehrmann were elected as Members-at-Large society, emotionally commented on by Tuulikki Makelainen.
of the EC. The Council also elected Gregory Makrides and Last but not least, Rolf Jeltsch gave an interesting presenta-
Rolf Jeltsch as lay auditors and PricewaterhouseCoopers tion on EMS history and activities under the title “Presiden-
as professional auditors for the accounts for the years cy (1999–2002)”.
2011 and 2012.
The agenda of the second day of the Council meet-
ing included several important items that unfortunately
cannot be presented here in detail but just enumerated:
report of the Newsletter Editor, reports on the Publishing
House and Zentralblatt MATH, the report of the Public-
ity Officer and then the reports from the EMS Commit-
tees (these reports were discussed in parallel sessions),
6ECM (Roman Srzednicki, the Chair of the Organizing
Committee, gave a presentation of the preparations for
A “side” of the Round Table “20th anniversary of EMS”: R. Jeltsch,
6ECM) and EUROMATH conferences for young people
J. P. Bourguignon, T. Makelainnen, A. Laptev, D. Salinger and M.
(presented by Gregory Makrides). Sanz-Solé.
8 EMS Newsletter December 2010