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College of Liberal Arts and Sciences University of Florida

Ramanujan Colloquium

Srinivasa Ramanujan

The Mathematics Department is pleased to announce the launch of a new annual distinguished colloquium series, the Ramanujan Colloquium, beginning in Spring 2007. Distinguished Visiting Professor George Andrews has generously offered to sponsor this colloquium for the first four years.

The Department currently has three distinguished colloquia: the Erdős Colloquium, the Ulam Colloquium, and the CAM Colloquium. These featured colloquia have brought eminent speakers to our department and raised our visibility campuswide and nationally.

The Department has one of the strongest programs in areas of mathematics influenced by Ramanujan, and Professor Andrews’s presence has significantly raised the stature of this program. Thus, it was felt that launching this new colloquium series would be worthwhile.

The Ramanujan Colloquium will focus on areas of mathematics influenced by Ramanujan. This is quite broad yet provides a sense of focus. The plan is to have a Ramanujan Lecturer visit our department for one week, give the featured Ramanujan Colloquium on Monday, and present seminars during the rest of the week. This will have a great impact on our research and graduate program.

The Ramanujan Colloquium will be held in the spring during the two months when Professor Andrews is here.

The first Ramanujan Colloquium will be held on Monday, March 19, 2007, and presented by Professor Manjul Bhargava of Princeton University. He will give seminars in the department during the rest of the week. Thus, the Ramanujan Colloquium is off to a fine start.

Bhargava is a new phenomenon in the world of mathematics. In a revolutionary PhD thesis at Princeton written under the direction of Andrew Wiles, Bhargava produced composition laws for forms of higher degree. This was the first real progress in this direction since Gauss, who produced a composition law for quadratic forms. Bhargava’s thesis is published as four papers in the Annals of Mathematics. At age 28, he was made a full professor at Princeton.

Bhargava was awarded the first SASTRA Ramanujan Prize in December 2005. This prize is awarded to mathematicians no older than 32 for outstanding contributions to areas influenced by Ramanujan. In his talk at SASTRA in Ramanujan’s hometown of Kumbakonam, India, on Ramanujan’s birthday, December 22, 2005, Bhargava announced the complete solution to a problem of Ramanujan on universal quadratic forms.

I wish to express our appreciation to Professor Andrews for sponsoring the Ramanujan Colloquium.

Krishnaswami Alladi
Chair (1998–2008)