Institute of Mathematics and its Applications
North Hampshire, Surrey & Berkshire Branch 
North Hampshire, Surrey & Berkshire Branch
| Talk Title: Tewkesbury and the Chocolate Factory | ||
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Presenter: Dr Heather Tewkesbury Talk Date: 11th May 2010 Talk Time: 19:30 Location: University of Reading Abstract: Join the North Hants, Surrey and Berkshire branch of the IMA for an evening's virtual tour of mathematics in the world of chocolate-making. |
| Talk Title: How to build an Olympic stadium | ||
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Presenter: Paul Shepherd Talk Date: 9th March 2010 Talk Time: 20:00 Location: Reading University Poster: Click Here Abstract: In less than 1000 days, London will host the 2012 Olympic games. More than nine million visitors are expected to watch 10,000 athletes compete in 26 sports at 34 venues around the UK. Maths is playing a critical part in the design and construction of these stunning venues. Paul Shepherd, who has helped to design sports stadiums around the world, shares the secrets behind the building of the Olympic Park and explores the practical ways that mathematics is being used in the construction and operation of this spectacular event. |
| Talk Title: Mathematics of Juggling | ||
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Presenter: Colin Wright Talk Date: Tuesday 12th January 2010 Talk Time: 19.30 Location: Reading University Poster: Click Here Abstract: Juggling has fascinated people for centuries. Seemingly oblivious to gravity, the skilled practitioner will keep several objects in the air at one time, and weave complex patterns that seem to defy analysis. In this talk the speaker demonstrates a selection of the patterns and skills of juggling while at the same time developing a simple method of describing and annotating a class of juggling patterns. By using elementary mathematics these patterns can be classified, leading to a simple way to describe those patterns that are known already, and a technique for discovering new ones. This talk is suitable for most ages. Those with some mathematical background will find plenty to keep them occupied, and those less experienced can enjoy the juggling as well as the exploration and exposition of this ancient skill. |
| Talk Title: Telescope Visit and Talk | ||
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Presenter: Cody Astronomical Society Talk Date: Feb 15th 2010 Talk Time: 18:30 - 20:30. Arrive Cody Gate 18:00. Location: QinetiQ Farnborough Abstract: Poster gone to IMA to distribute. Max 30 persons. |
| Talk Title: Mathematics of Rock Guitars' | ||
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Presenter: Mark Lewney Talk Date: Wednesday 23rd September 2009 Talk Time: AGM 17:30 - Talk 18:00 Location: QinetiQ Farnborough Poster: Click Here Abstract: What causes the revolutionary, history-changing sound of rock guitar, and how does it help us to understand the nature of the stuff we’re made of? Famelab winner Mark Lewney explains the maths of rock using riffs from Vivaldi to AC/DC, explains the secret of the Stradivarius and shows how string vibrations might lie at the heart of the Big Questions about the universe. In this entertaining and mind-expanding lecture, acoustics expert Dr. Lewney explains the maths of vibrations with the help of props as diverse as an air-bazooka, a bullwhip and his custom Ibanez electric guitar through a Marshall amp, turned up loud, with live demonstrations of expert rock guitar playing throughout. Charming stories and mind-bending animations are used to try to get the audience to think in 4-, 5- or even 11-D. This introduction to Superstring Theory shares the wonder and excitement of such grand scale, cutting edge maths and physics. |
| Talk Title: Historical Analysis | ||
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Presenter: David Rowland Talk Date: Tuesday 19th May 2009 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: BAE Systems Park Centre, Farnborough Poster: Click Here Abstract: The talk will outline, with examples, the evolution of Historical Analysis of military performance from comparisons of simulated and real live combat. This allowed live combat degradation estimates to be established one weapon class at a time. Extra effects of suppression, surprise and shock were also deduced from progressively increased samples. The net result of this approach was the ability to make empirical estimates of effects which other techniques had been unable to quantify. |
| Talk Title: Crowd Dynamics | ||
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Presenter: Professor Keith Still Talk Date: Tuesday 10th March 2009 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Reading University Poster: Click Here Abstract: Simulating emergency evacuations has grown in popularity since the tragic events of September 11th. Unfortunately there are a large number of modelling, simulation, animation and computer graphics systems available today - many of which are dangerously misleading. A background to crowd dynamics modelling and simulations, their purpose and objectives followed by a risk assessment analysis description is presented. |
| Talk Title: Mathematical Modelling of Information Age Conflict | ||
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Presenter: Prof Jim Moffat Talk Date: Tuesday 13th January 2009 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: BAE Systems Park Centre, Farnborough Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: Previous mathematical modelling of conflict has been based on Lanchester's equations, which relate to the grinding attrition of 'Industrial Age' warfare. Large blocks of force interact in order to force defeat by a process of wearing away each other. This is no longer so relevant as a way of conceptualising warfare, and in this talk I show how we can generalise the approach so that it is more appropriate to the 'Information Age' into which we are all now moving. |
| Talk Title: Effective Mathematics, Effective Mathematicians | ||
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Presenter: Dr I. David Abrahams Talk Date: Thursday 13th November 2008 Talk Time: 7:00PM Location: Palmer Building, Reading University Poster: Click Here Abstract: As is customary for such addresses, this presentation will be in two parts. The first offers a serendipitous, and hopefully widely accessible, overview of some of the mathematics and physics that the speaker finds interesting in the general area of wave dynamics. The second focuses briefly on the many issues affecting our community and on the effective role that mathematicians, and the IMA and other learned societies in particular, can play. |
| Talk Title: Merger Consultation with local branch members | ||
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Presenter: IMA and LMS Presidents Talk Date: Tuesday 28th October 2008 Talk Time: 6:30PM Location: Rooms 3-5, BAE Systems Park Centre, Farnborough |
| Talk Title: Using the Bayesian Approach for Simple Binomial Problems | ||
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Presenter: Paul Earwicker Talk Date: Tuesday 23rd September 2008 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Rooms 3-5, BAE Systems Park Centre, Farnborough Abstract: This talk will discuss learning from Binomial data. Topics include: 1) Confidence intervals for the binomial parameter and Poisson Mean; 2) Calculating the probability that one binomial parameter is less than another using the Altham's formula; 3) The multinomial density and its relation to the Dirichlet density |
| Talk Title: The fundamental capacity limits of wireless cellular systems | ||
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Presenter: Dr Reza Hoshyar Talk Date: Wednesday 21st May 2008 Talk Time: AGM 7:30 p.m. followed by the Talk at 8:00 p.m Location: Room 1 & 2, The Oak Suite, Oak House, University of Surrey. Poster: Click Here Abstract: In the information-theoretic literature, the Shannon capacity theorem (1948) states that for a point-to-point communication over a noisy channel the system rate is sharply bounded by the channel capacity. More simply, any communication with rate above capacity will definitely fail, while for rates below capacity error-free communication is possible. In this talk a short review on the information theoretic concepts and the capacity theorem will be provided. Then the theorem will be applied to a large wireless cellular system with all its base stations connected to a hyper processor forming effectively a distributed antenna system. The presented analysis will provide a fundamental capacity limit on the achievable performance of any wireless cellular system. Further it will be shown that the capacity of all possible cellular systems with different propagation conditions, user terminals and base stations density can be expressed through one unified figure of merit. |
| Talk Title: Can you keep a secret? You can with quantum cryptography! | ||
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Presenter: Dr Philip Bond Talk Date: Wednesday 19th March 2008 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Room 1.05, Palmer building, University of Reading Poster: Click Here Abstract: Keeping messages and data secret is an essential part of modern life. Secrecy is needed when you send your credit card details over the internet for example. However whilst it is believed that modern secrecy systems (cryptosystems) are very strong it has never been rigorously proven. If we want absolute and guaranteed security how can we achieve it? This talk will show how it can done. |
| Talk Title: Easing the diseasing with infection inspection. | ||
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Presenter: Dr Nathan Green Talk Date: Tuesday 20th November 2007 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Old Ively Road, Pyestock, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: This presentation will be concerned with optimal intervention policies for a continuous-time stochastic SIR (susceptible, infective, removed) model for the spread of infection through a closed population. In previous work on such optimal policies, it is common to assume that model parameter values are known; in reality, uncertainty over parameter values exists. The effect upon the optimal policy of changes in parameter estimates shall be considered, and of explicitly taking into account parameter uncertainty via a Bayesian decision theoretic framework. Policies allowing for (i) The isolation of any number of infectives, or (ii) The immunisation of all susceptibles (total immunisation) will be investigated and numerical examples given to illustrate the results. |
| Talk Title: The Mathematics of Football Spread Betting and Other Dodgy Gambles. | ||
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Presenter: Professor Alistair Fitt Talk Date: Wednesday 19th September 2007 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Reading University Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: The valuation of football spread bets will be considered in this talk. Spread betting has become a huge growth industry in recent years, and this leads one to ask how the bookmakers set the spreads and whether there are any possibilities for "profitable investment". It will also be shown how a variant of classical Markowitz portfolio theory may be applied to football spread betting to allow one to define an "optimal betting portfolio". If there is time, some other types of betting may also be considered. |
| Talk Title: The fundamental capacity limits of wireless cellular systems | ||
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Presenter: Dr Reza Hoshyar Talk Date: Wednesday 21st May 2008 Talk Time: AGM 7:30 p.m. followed by the Talk at 8:00 p.m Location: Room 1 & 2, The Oak Suite, Oak House, University of Surrey. Poster: Click Here Abstract: In the information-theoretic literature, the Shannon capacity theorem (1948) states that for a point-to-point communication over a noisy channel the system rate is sharply bounded by the channel capacity. More simply, any communication with rate above capacity will definitely fail, while for rates below capacity error-free communication is possible. In this talk a short review on the information theoretic concepts and the capacity theorem will be provided. Then the theorem will be applied to a large wireless cellular system with all its base stations connected to a hyper processor forming effectively a distributed antenna system. The presented analysis will provide a fundamental capacity limit on the achievable performance of any wireless cellular system. Further it will be shown that the capacity of all possible cellular systems with different propagation conditions, user terminals and base stations density can be expressed through one unified figure of merit. |
| Talk Title: Can you keep a secret? You can with quantum cryptography! | ||
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Presenter: Dr Philip Bond Talk Date: Wednesday 19th March 2008 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Room 1.05, Palmer building, University of Reading Poster: Click Here Abstract: Keeping messages and data secret is an essential part of modern life. Secrecy is needed when you send your credit card details over the internet for example. However whilst it is believed that modern secrecy systems (cryptosystems) are very strong it has never been rigorously proven. If we want absolute and guaranteed security how can we achieve it? This talk will show how it can done. |
| Talk Title: Easing the diseasing with infection inspection. | ||
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Presenter: Dr Nathan Green Talk Date: Tuesday 20th November 2007 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Old Ively Road, Pyestock, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: This presentation will be concerned with optimal intervention policies for a continuous-time stochastic SIR (susceptible, infective, removed) model for the spread of infection through a closed population. In previous work on such optimal policies, it is common to assume that model parameter values are known; in reality, uncertainty over parameter values exists. The effect upon the optimal policy of changes in parameter estimates shall be considered, and of explicitly taking into account parameter uncertainty via a Bayesian decision theoretic framework. Policies allowing for (i) The isolation of any number of infectives, or (ii) The immunisation of all susceptibles (total immunisation) will be investigated and numerical examples given to illustrate the results. |
| Talk Title: The Mathematics of Football Spread Betting and Other Dodgy Gambles. | ||
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Presenter: Professor Alistair Fitt Talk Date: Wednesday 19th September 2007 Talk Time: 8:00PM Location: Reading University Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: The valuation of football spread bets will be considered in this talk. Spread betting has become a huge growth industry in recent years, and this leads one to ask how the bookmakers set the spreads and whether there are any possibilities for "profitable investment". It will also be shown how a variant of classical Markowitz portfolio theory may be applied to football spread betting to allow one to define an "optimal betting portfolio". If there is time, some other types of betting may also be considered. |
| Talk Title: Elliptic curves and applications | ||
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Presenter: Dr. Steven Galbraith Talk Date: Wednesday 6th June 2007 Talk Time: AGM 7:15 p.m. Talk 8:00 p.m. Location: Royal Holloway, Egham, Surrey. Poster: Click Here Abstract: A very basic introduction to elliptic curves will be given. Applications, especially to cryptography, will be discussed. |
| Talk Title: Non-diagonal Magic Squares and why Domino Sets typically go to a double-six or a double-twelve | ||
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Presenter: David Byrne Talk Date: Thursday 15th March 2007 Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Old Ively Road, Pyestock, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: This accessible talk is aimed at anyone who has an interest in number games and basic graph theory. Magic squares are introduced and after some basic examples a technique is shown whereby large magic squares can be generated with elegance and ease. After this start the talk will then shift to domino sets showing a possible reason as to why double-six and double-twelve sets are typically used. The final trot will be about knight's tours and show a possible solution to a knight's tour that is a magic square. It is hoped that the talk will stimulate the audience to share their tricks and tips and for some of the ideas to be taken away and developed at leisure. |
| Talk Title: Non-Parametric Measures of Association in Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Campaign Analysis. | ||
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Presenter: Dr Andrew Hossack Talk Date: Thursday 1st February 2007 Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Old Ively Road, Pyestock, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Abstract: This presentation will describe how non-parametric inferential statistics techniques more commonly found in the social sciences have been used in recent research within MoD to identify success factors for states and their security forces in generic counter-insurgency (COIN) campaigns that are statistically significantly associated with the achievement of campaign success. The Goodman-Kruskal Gamma and Somers' D measures of association will be reviewed, their mechanisms of operation outlined and the application of them to the military analytical problem discussed. Finally, an unorthodox (and possibly insane) home-brewed local extension of Gamma from a bivariate to a trivariate measure of association developed to address a subsidiary analysis problem from this research whilst making maximum use of the information content in a strictly limited size data sample will be discussed. |
| Talk Title: Modern encryption | ||
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Presenter: Richard Pinch Talk Date: Thursday 23rd November 2006 Talk Time: 7:30 p.m. Location: Oxford Brooks University, Headington Campus, Oxford. Poster: Click Here |
| Talk Title: An Introduction to the Early Universe and How it Evolved | ||
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Presenter: Dr Dan Tilley Talk Date: Thursday 28th September 2006 Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Old Ively Road, Pyestock, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: Dr Dan Tilley takes us through his life in mathematics and his work with the IMA before discussing his PhD work on how the early universe evolved, including an overview of some of the most exciting current theories and ending with an example of how Large Scale Structure in the universe formed. |
| Talk Title: From curiosity to Commerce | ||
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Presenter: Professor Peter Grindrod Talk Date: Wednesday 12th July 2006 Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: Palmer Building, Reading University, Whiteknights Campus. Poster: Click Here Abstract: Peter Grindrod, the current President of the IMA, is Visiting Professor in Applied and Industrial Mathematics at the Universities of Oxford and Bath. He has worked within the commercial sector for over seventeen years managing the development and application of mathematical methods to gain business insights from very large databases for extremely large retailers and packaged goods manufacturers. |
| Talk Title: How to Solve Sudoku | ||
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Presenter: Professor Robin Wilson Talk Date: Wednesday 3rd May 2006 Talk Time: AGM 7:15 p.m. Talk 8:00 p.m. Location: Pegasus Conference Room, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Abstract: What is sudoku? Where did it come from? How do you solve it? and What mathematical problems arise? This illustrated talk will reveal all. |
| Talk Title: Historical Analysis for the Realistic Representation of Time in Combat Simulations. | ||
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Presenter: Thursday 28th May 2005 Talk Date: Dr Dan Tilley Talk Time: 7:30 p.m. Location: Pegasus Conference Room, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: The main subject of this paper examines historical evidence to determine if it is possible to provide quantified guidelines to war-gaming analysts and model developers on the representation of realistic battle times within war-games and models of land combat. Data from a number of historical case studies (WWII - Gulf War) were extracted and used to understand the realistic pace of events in an operation, including studying time between orders to advance, the rates of advance, obstacles and other problems. The understanding of factors limiting operational tempo and the problems that may be encountered during an operation (and how to avoid them) are some of the key drivers to understanding the factors that lead to campaign success. |
| Talk Title: Continuity and its Role in Mathematics. | ||
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Presenter: Thursday 28th May 2005 Talk Date: Dr S Catterall Talk Time: 7:30 p.m. Location: Pegasus Conference Room, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Abstract: Continuity is a concept of central importance in mathematics. It means that, in some sense, a function or system has a predictable output. This predictability is very useful from a human point of view. During this half hour presentation various manifestations of continuity will be described in areas of pure and applied mathematics. The presentation should give some idea of the importance of continuity in contemporary mathematics. |
| Talk Title: The IMA Presidential Address. | ||
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Presenter: Thursday 14th April 2005 Talk Date: Professor Timothy Pedley Talk Time: 7:30 p.m. Location: B-Wing Reception, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Abstract: Professor Pedley will talk about what he means by applying mathematics, with examples from simple dimensional analysis and from his own subject of fluid dynamics in biology and medicine, in particular the blood flow in the neck of the giraffe and the modelling of populations of swimming micro-organisms. He will also comment on some of the issues facing mathematics in the UK at the moment. |
| Talk Title: Tutoring our young: What can we learn from ethnographers?. | ||
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Presenter: Thursday 29th July 2004 Talk Date: Dr Cookie Liu Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Farnborough, Hants. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: Whether or not you’re an educator, chances are that you’ll find yourself tutoring someone sometime in some socio-cultural settings. Our scientific roots have trained us to be self-critical in order to pursue absolute truths and objective knowledge that we could then make available to all. But social interactions often sit uncomfortably with causal analysis and they seldom make a good subject for the testing of statistical hypotheses. Educational processes in tutoring are intricately bound to the underlying social dynamics within a given cultural environment. In this talk, I set out the educational relevance of an under-exposed topic of private supplementary tutoring in mathematics and its potential contribution to the existing body of knowledge. I then introduce ethnography as both a research method and a product and argue that in order to reach out to those thick, rich and context-sensitive research data, we’d need to venture beyond the traditional positivist approach and start complementing our quantitative methods with a sprinkle of interpretative seasoning from our friends, the ethnographers. |
| Talk Title: Passive Emitter Location. | ||
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Presenter: Tuesday 11th November 2003 Talk Date: Professor Edward Stansfield Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: B-Wing Reception, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: Passive Emitter Location is an essential component of modern Electronic Warfare systems. Radio signals used for communications, radar or navigation reveal the presence of an opponent, and the location of the source of the transmissions provides information about enemy activities. This talk will describe an algorithm that uses different types of passive measurements to locate an emitter. |
| Talk Title: Historical Analysis: The Statistical Analysis of Contemporary and Historical, Operations Data. | ||
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Presenter: Tuesday 11th November 2003 Talk Date: Dr Dan Tilley Talk Time: 8:00 p.m. Location: B-Wing Reception, TRL, Crowthorne. Poster: Click Here Presentation: Click Here Abstract: Historical Analysis can be defined as the analysis of historical data from operations to provide quantification of the underlying factors inherent in the military operations and conflict, which drive campaign success. Historical Analysis uses data from historians, military analysts and primary source material, in a structured form to identify and quantify the factors involved in military operations. Historical Analysis is considered to be one of the main operational analysis techniques employed alongside, war-gaming, simulation etc. This paper will briefly outline the role HA plays in Dstl's provision of defence OR to MOD, describe some of the issues arising from with the use of real operational data and give an example of one of the classical results produced by HA studies. |
| Talk Title: Why we believe in the Big Bang. | ||
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Presenter: Thursday 3rd July 2003 Talk Date: Dr Lewis Ryder Talk Time: 7:30p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Farnborough. Poster: Click Here Abstract: Two strong reasons are presented for entertaining a belief in the "big bang" origin of the universe. The first is the discovery of quantities of helium in the sun, which must have been there from the beginning. The second is the existence of three species of neutrino - rather than four. The physical arguments leading to these conclusions will be shown. |
| Talk Title: Renormalisation in Dynamical Systems | ||
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Presenter: Wednesday 21st May 2003 Talk Date: Dr Andrew Osbaldestin Talk Time: AGM 7:30p.m, Talk 8:15p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Farnborough Poster: Click Here Abstract: Renormalization theory is a powerful mathematical tool that helps explain why many seemingly disparate systems follow identical laws. After a brief introduction outlining the use of renormalization ideas in the theory of phase transitions, we shall consider a simple pedagogical example from dynamics, namely the calculation of the period of the mathematical pendulum. We shall then go on to see how renormalization theory is used to explain the quantitative universality witnessed in the period-doubling route to chaos. Other examples briefly considered will be loss of stability in dissipative and Hamiltonian systems, and the beautiful realm of complex dynamics. |
| Talk Title: Some Applications of Mathematics to Information Security. | ||
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Presenter: Tuesday 4th February 2003 Talk Date: Professor Fred Piper Talk Time: 8:30p.m. Location: B-Wing Reception, TRL, Crowthorne Poster: Click Here Abstract: Security is often regarded as one of the main inhibitors to the global adoption of e-commerce. In this talk we will look at some of the ways in which mathematics is applied to protect information during storage or transmission over insecure networks. |
| Talk Title: A Random Walk Through a Mathematically-based career. | ||
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Presenter: Wednesday 25th September 2002 Talk Date: Dr Henry Pearson Talk Time: 7:30p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Farnborough Poster: Click Here Abstract: The talk will take a personal view of a number of mathematical results and themes that the speaker has found fascinating and useful during his career. It will focus mainly on random walks and associated stochastic processes, such as Brownian Motion, and their use in modelling complex physical phenomena in fluid mechanics. Practical examples will be given from the ‘grubby’ end of the subject: pollutants emitted from chimneys under stable atmospheric conditions and the fate of micron-sized particles discharged into the ocean from (treated) sewage outfalls. |
| Talk Title: Mathematics - The Driving Force in Digital Signal Processing. | ||
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Presenter: Tuesday 15th May 2002 Talk Date: Dr John McWhirter Talk Time: 7:00p.m. Location: Cody Sports & Social Club, Farnborough Poster: Click Here Abstract: Mathematics plays a vital role in all aspects of digital signal processing (DSP). The purpose of this talk is to communicate in general terms where and why mathematics is required in this important area of research. In order to give the talk some coherence, I will focus on the topic of sensor array signal processing. Sensor arrays now play an important role in a variety of applications ranging from phased array radar, sonar and mobile communications to medical diagnostic techniques such as ECG and EEG. I will try to explain some important techniques which have already been enabled by digital signal processing and outline some exciting avenues for future mathematical research in the area. |