News and Announcements

A blue plaque honouring the eminent mathematician Dame Mary Cartwright FRS FRSE has been unveiled at her former Cambridge home. The blue plaques scheme, overseen by Historic England on behalf of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, celebrates historic individuals who made a significant impact within their fields and wider society.

Mary Cartwright was Mistress of Girton College from 1949 until 1968, the longest-serving head in the college's history. She was the first woman mathematician elected a fellow of the Royal Society and the first woman to serve as president of the London Mathematical Society.

Professor Dhruv Ranganathan (DPMMS) has won a 2026 Pilkington Prize. The Prizes are awarded annually by the University of Cambridge to recognise outstanding contributions to undergraduate and postgraduate teaching. 

The Pilkington Prize recognises Dhruv Ranganathan's outstanding work as the Director of the Faculty of Mathematics’ Summer Research in Mathematics (SRIM) and Cambridge Mathematics Placements (CMP) programmes. These represent a major new strand of our undergraduate degree opportunities, involving up to 90 students annually.

The SRIM programme gives participating students their first taste of research, their first time publicly presenting their work, and often their first experience working collaboratively. The CMP programme enables undergraduate students to have impact on real-world problems across a range of industries and other academic disciplines by importing their specific mathematical expertise.

The Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics (DAMTP) has appointed Miranda C. N. Cheng as Professor of Data-Intensive Mathematical Physics. Cheng will be the first person to hold this newly created role.

Professor Nick Dorey, Head of DAMTP, says: "Miranda Cheng's work has uncovered remarkable connections between areas of pure mathematics, such as number theory and topology, and fundamental physics. Most recently, she has focused on applying machine learning methods to problems in mathematical physics and, conversely, on adapting ideas from physics to provide a theoretical framework for artificial intelligence. Her appointment builds new bridges between different research communities within DAMTP and is an exciting development for the Department".

The University of Cambridge has announced the launch of Cambridge x QRT Labs, part of a major new philanthropic partnership supported by Qube Research & Technologies (QRT). The new joint initiative brings together researchers across Cambridge, Imperial College London and the University of Oxford to advance research in mathematics, AI and complex systems. 

This long‑term initiative will support more than 70 early‑career researchers across the three universities, including PhD students and postdoctoral fellows, beginning in 2026. QRT’s generous gift establishes a collaborative framework designed to advance research at the frontiers of mathematics, statistics, computer science and engineering.