By Dr. Ruth Bowness
Conference Reports
Philip Maini’s 60th birthday Workshop, University of Oxford, UK
By Professor Ruth Baker
The conference was a great success: the diversity of excellent talks, combined with over 40 poster contributions, made for a very engaging two days. The conference ran smoothly, and served as an excellent showcase of mathematical biology, both the history and accomplishments to-date, and the future potential and trajectory.
The main purpose of the workshop was of course to celebrate the many achievements of Prof Philip Maini on the occasion of his 60th birthday. To understand Philip’s contributions it is necessary to look beyond publications and numbers, and consider the many lives he has touched and the countless positive interactions he has had with colleagues and students. This sentiment was completely evident during the two days, with an overwhelming outpouring of respect and gratitude for Philip expressed by many participants and in a multitude of ways.
The conference included several special features: a public lecture by David Sumpter on “Soccermatics”, attended by conference attendees and around 200 external attendees; two footballs signed by all attendees and given to Philip at the end; an enormous and beautiful cake complete with reaction-diffusion equations, various types of pattern formation, and crests for all the schools and colleges with which Philip has had affiliation; and, given Philip’s affinity for football, a well-attended informal football match to conclude the conference.
Scottish Mathematical Biology Forum 2019 in Edinburgh, UK
By Dr. Ruth Bowness and Dr. Cicely Macnamara
On Thursday 5th December 2019 a one-day workshop, the Scottish Mathematical Biology Forum (SMBF), was held at the International Centre for Mathematical Sciences (ICMS) in Edinburgh, UK to showcase mathematical biology research undertaken at Scottish universities and research institutes. The scientific organisation was undertaken by the University of St Andrews Mathematical Biology group. A diverse range of speakers presented brief review talks on a variety of topics, from modelling immunology, heart muscle growth and cancer, to Bayesian inference of cell state transition dynamics and analysis of root growth. A detailed programme can be found here. The event also helped to stimulate new collaborative projects and share expertise across the discipline.
A similar event was held at ICMS last year, organised by Professor Andy White from Heriot-Watt University, where he hoped to re-invigorate the once annual event. After this second successful meeting, the SMBF is now established as a yearly gathering for mathematical biologists in Scotland. SMBF 2020 will be organised by colleagues at the University of Stirling and SMBF 2021 by researchers at the University of Glasgow.
The organisers are grateful for the financial support from the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (IMA) QJMAM fund and the Glasgow Mathematical Journal Learning and Research Support Fund.
Upcoming Conferences
- BAMM! Biology and Medicine through Mathematics!
May 13-15 2020. Richmond, VA, USA
siam.vcu.edu/bamm/ - 18thEcology and Evolution of Infectious Diseases meeting
June 14-17 2020. Montpellier, France
www.eeidconference2020.org/ - 19th International Symposium on Dynamic Games and Applications
June 16-19 2020. Porto, Portugal
www.gerad.ca/colloques/isdg2020/index.html - 8th European Congress of Mathematics
July 5-11 2020. Primorska, Slovenia
www.8ecm.si - 12th ECMTB Conference/Annual SMB meeting
August 31-September 4 2020. Heidelberg, Germany www.esmtb.org/event-3568551
Job Openings
See www.smb.org/forums/forum/open-positions/ for open positions.