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Several members of the Department of Mathematics community were recognized for their achievements at the recent Joint Mathematics Meetings in Boston.

Collecting prizes at the annual conference included professors Tom Mrowka, Bjorn Poonen, and Scott Sheffield, CLE Moore instructor Jia Shi, seniors Anqi Li and Ilani Axelrod-Freed, and alums Letong Carina Hong ’22 and Nataša Šešum PhD ’04.

Congratulations to all!

Pavel Etingof has been elected to the European Academy of Sciences and Arts. Academy members are elected for their outstanding achievements in science, arts and governance and hold exceptional standing in society as a result of their scientific work, publications or leadership.

To celebrate his achievement, we enlisted chatGPT of OpenAI to generate a poem about Pavel:

Pavel Etingof, master of math,
Whose mind is sharp and nimble,
Has been elected to the European Academy,
Where his contributions will be celebrated fully.

His work in representation theory,
Has helped to advance our understanding,
Of complex mathematical concepts,
That have long been demanding.

But he is not just a scholar,
His mentoring skills are second to none,
As the Chief Research Advisor of the PRIMES program,
He has helped many young minds to become.

And in his spare time,
He can be found in the forest,
Foraging for mushrooms,
His knowledge of which is the best,

Is truly impressive,
And his love of nature,
Shines through in all that he does,

We celebrate this momentous occasion,
And honor the achievements of our colleague and friend,
May he continue to excel and innovate,
In the pursuit of knowledge without end.

Congratulations, Pavel!

Four graduate students received the 2023 named PRIMES mentorships for exceptional mentor service.

Three receiving the 2023 George Lusztig Mentorships:

Nitya Mani, who is studying graph theory, probability, and optimization, is a PRIMES, SPUR, and GUMMI mentor, whose PRIMES student Edward Yu won the Gold Medal in Math at the 2022 USA S.-T. Yau High School Science Award.

Mary Stelow is a co-coordinator of PRIMES Circle and has mentored for RSI and DRP, and is a GUMMI co-chair. Her research interests are in gauge theory, Floer theory, and low dimensional topology.

Dr. Kent Vashaw is an NSF Mathematical Science Research postdoc and instructor whose research interests broadly are at the intersection of homological algebra, noncommutative algebra, and representation theory.

The 2023 Bershadsky Mentor Award, courtesy of Michael and Victoria Bershadsky, is awarded to Julius Baldauf ’19, who been both a student and mentor for DRP, SPUR, and UROP, and is active with Yulia's Dream. Julius was awarded the Rogers Prize for the best SPUR paper in 2018, and the Charles and Holly Housman Award for excellence in teaching in 2022. Julius' research interests are in geometry and analysis.

Congratulations Nitya, Mary, Kent, and Julius, and thank you Professor Lusztig and Michael & Victoria Bershadsky for making these mentorships possible!

Two seniors were honored with the Association for Women in Mathematics’ annual Alice T. Schafer Prize for excellence in mathematics by an undergraduate woman.

Anqi Li has been named the runner-up, and Ilani Axelrod-Freed received an honorable mention. Their achievements and statements are on the AWM site, and their prizes will be presented at the upcoming Joint Mathematics Meetings in Boston.

Congratulations, Anqi and Ilani!

CLE Moore instructor Jia Shi will receive the seventh annual Association for Women in Mathematics Dissertation Prize.

Jia and two others will each be presented with the 2023 AWM Dissertation Prize at the January 4 Joint Prize Session at the 2023 Joint Mathematics Meetings in Boston.

Mentored by Gigliola Staffilani, Jia is interested in fluid mechanics and partial differential equations. She received her PhD at Princeton University with Charles Fefferman and Javier Gomez-Serrano as advisors.

Congratulations, Jia!