Professor David Spiegelhalter on statistics in the time of COVID, award-winning research insights, and supporting education during school closures... |
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Communicating statistics in the time of COVID: Professor David Spiegelhalter wins Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize |
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Professor David Spiegelhalter, Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication at the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics, has won the Royal Society's 2020 Michael Faraday Prize. The prestigious prize recognises his achievements in communicating key insights from statistics and probability to both decision makers and the public at large, most recently through the COVID-19 pandemic.
He tells us more about the importance – and pitfalls – of helping the public, journalists and policy makers to interpret and understand the numbers that now make daily headlines. |
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Clearing the air: making indoor spaces COVID-safe |
Professor Paul Linden is a leader in studying the fluid mechanics of ventilation in buildings, but in the light of the pandemic his work has taken on a new dimension. Working with colleagues in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics (DAMTP), the group's recent research has explored the effects of ventilation on indoor spread of COVID-19. |
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Faculty researchers win Whitehead Prizes |
Every year, the London Mathematical Society recognises the achievements of outstanding early-career researchers with the award of its prestigious Whitehead Prizes. In 2020, three of the six prizes awarded went to Cambridge mathematicians. They tell us more about their award-winning work, and what the prizes mean to them, in the interviews below. |
Dr Holly Krieger (DPMMS) has been awarded a Whitehead Prize by the London Mathematical Society for her 'deep contributions to arithmetic dynamics'. Discover more about her work and how it is linked to the famous Mandelbrot set. |
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Dr Maria Bruna (DAMTP) has won a Whitehead Prize for her 'outstanding research in asymptotic homogenisation'. We explore what her research involves and its applications – including helping Dyson to build better vacuum cleaners. |
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Dr Henry Wilton (DPMMS) has won a Whitehead Prize for his 'remarkable contributions to geometric and combinatorial group theory'. We talked to him to discover more about this fascinating field. |
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From entropy to information |
The Faculty is delighted to welcome Ioannis Kontoyiannis as the new Churchill Professor of Mathematics, based at the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics (DPMMS). We talked to him to learn more about his far-ranging research in information theory. |
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Reaching out to wider audiences |
Universe Unravelled: new documentary series |
The Stephen Hawking Centre for Theoretical Cosmology (DAMTP) has teamed up with Discovery on a documentary series exploring the quest to understand our Universe. Featuring interviews with Cambridge researchers and students, the series explores what we already know, what cosmologists are working on now, and what they hope to find out in the future. |
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Supporting maths education during school closures |
When the COVID-19 pandemic closed schools in March 2020, the Faculty's NRICH mathematics education programme reacted swiftly to provide vital support to schoolchildren, their parents and teachers, reaching over 1.5 million UK users. |
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Professor John D Barrow FRS, 1952–2020 |
The Faculty was deeply saddened by the death of Professor John D Barrow FRS on 26 September 2020. A renowned cosmologist and mathematical physicist, he also had a profound influence on the public understanding of science through his outreach lectures, his many popular science books, and his leadership of the Millennium Mathematics Project. |
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Our campaign for the University and Colleges of Cambridge is raising funds to attract the brightest minds, create the finest facilities and give the freedom to create more world-changing ideas. To do this, we need your help. |
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