Spring 2008

April: The Graduate Committee has awarded the graduate students awards for the year 2008.

• Top Graduate Student: Kun Zhao.
• Outstanding Teaching Assistants: Selma Yildirim and Stephen Young.
• Festa Fellowship: Ian Palmer and Kun Zhao.

March: Dear All, Our PhD student Mitch Keller is one of three TAs across Campus who won the 2008 CETL/BP Outstanding TA Award! Mitch was recognized for "innovative use of teaching methods, mentoring students majoring in math, contributing to a textbook in Combinatorics, and overall clear demonstration of commitment to teaching Georgia Tech's undergraduates and to improving education within the field of mathematics." Congratulations, Mitch! Luca Dieci

To the School of Mathematics Community: I am very pleased to report that Mitch Keller has been named as one of three winners of the 2008 CETL/BP teaching assistant award. Mitch and his two other co-winners will be recognized at the annual Student Awards Luncheon that will be held this year on April 17. Please excuse the academic parental pride but it has been both a privelege and a pleasure to serve as supervisor of Mitch's progress towards a Ph.D. and to have worked alongside him - more as colleague than supervisor - in teaching Math 3012 last year. Best, Tom T.

March: Dear Colleagues, US News has just published its ranking of graduate programs, placing GT Math at #36 nationally, with the discrete and combinatorial group at #7. Congratulations! Evans

March: The Graduate Student Symposium was held yesterday. See sga.gatech.edu/symposium Our PhD students Mitch Keller and Stephen Young did very well in the "Oral Presentation" category and won "Best Oral" and "Runner-up" in the College of Sciences. Well done Mitch and Stephen! Luca Dieci

March: I am very pleased to report that our colleague Doron Lubinsky has been named as one of two faculty members selected from the ranks of Engineering and Mathematics units who have played a "vital role in improving the learning environment for female students, and in encouraging positive participation and success." This award is presented by the Women in Engineering society and, he will be honored at their 2008 Excellence Awards Banquet to be held March 27, 2008. Also, Doron will receive a $1500 award! Please join me in extending hearty congratulations to Doron! Tom T.

February: Adam Tart, one of our discrete math majors (who graduated last year), has recently won the highly prestigious George J. Mitchell Scholarship to study in Ireland. He was one of only 12 U.S. undergraduates to receive this award. See weblink for details.

January: To the School of Mathematics Community: Please join me in extending hearty congratulations to our colleague Lew Lefton who has just been named as the winner of the 2008 Administrative Service Award. Lew will be honored at the annual campus-wide awards ceremony that will be held later this spring. Lew's invaluable service as IT Director for both the School of Mathematics and the College of Sciences was cited in the nomination, and we are certainly fortunate to have benefitted from Lew's hard work and enlightened IT leadership since his arrival on campus. CONGRATS Lew!! Tom T.

Dear all, I would like to add my voice to congratulate Lew and all the IT team from our school. Truth is I consider we have a tremendously fine IT team. Every single time I have been in need of any help, I have received their fast, efficient and friendly support that has always solved any problem within minutes. Congratulations Lew, and although the award has Lew's name, I extend my congratulation to Justin, Matt, and all the IT team. Best regards, David Jimenez (SoM Graduate Student)

Congratulations. Math IT works. If something is wrong, it gets fixed. If I have a (sometimes stupid) question, it gets answered. Compare with a (campus wide) IT organization. The difference is night and day. Tom Morley

Fall 2007

November: To the School of Mathematics Community: On behalf of the students of Georgia Tech, I would like to extend *hearty* congratulations to Michael Lacey, Matt Baker, Michael Loss, Tom Morley and Enid Steinbart on the news that their MCTP proposal has been recommended for funding by the DMS division of the National Science Foundation. This large scale proposal targets undergraduate students and will enable the School of Mathematics to make substantive advances in a program that is already a national model. The award will be for five years and will draw $730,000. Major Kudos to the co-PI's. Tom T.

November: To the School of Mathematics Community: I am very pleased to report that our colleague Dr. Yuri Bakhtin will receive an NSF CAREER award. These prestigious and highly competitive grants are for a 5-year period and support the recipient's growth and development in research and also as a teacher and mentor. Yuri is the 8th member of the School of Mathematics community to earn this distinction. Previous winners include Saugata Basu, John Etnyre, Mohammad Ghomi, Rob Ghrist, Dana Randall, Chongchun Zeng and Hao-Min Zhou. Please join me in extending to Yuri our heartiest congratulations! Tom Trotter

September: I am pleased to report that our colleagues:

• Christine Heitsch, PI: School of Mathematics
• Stephen Harvey, Co-PI: School of Biology
• David Bader, Co-PI: College of Computing

Spring 2007

• Top Graduate Student: Armen Vagharshakyan.
• Outstanding Teaching Assistant: Suleyman Ulusoy.
• Festa Fellowship: David Jimenez.

February: To the School of Mathematics Community: I am very pleased to report that our colleague, Dr. Thomas Morley has been honored as the recipient of the 2007 Institute award for "Outstanding Innovative Use of Education Technology." Tom will receive a commemorative plaque *plus* a $7500 award. The nomination materials were prepared by Fred Andrew, and in communicating back the news of the award, Dr. William Hunt, Committee Chair, wrote that his committee was particularly impressed with the outreach to K-12 component of Dr. Morley's work. Congratulations to Tom!!

To the School of Mathematics community: I am very pleased to report that Hao-Min Zhou will receive an NSF Career Award. This is the highest recognition that young scientists, engineers and mathematicians can receive from the NSF. Hao-Min joins four current School of Mathematics faculty who also received NSF Career awards: Saugata Basu, John Etnyre, Mohammad Ghomi and Chongchun Zeng. Former SOM faculty colleagues who also received this award are Dana Randall and Rob Ghrist. Our heartiest congratulations to Hao-Min! Tom T.

February:To the School of Mathematics Community, I am very pleased to report that Matt Baker has been selected as the recipient of the 2007 CETL/BP Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award. Previously, Matt was awarded the 2005 Class of 1969 Teaching Fellow Award. Congratulations to Matt for another signal honor! Tom T.

Fall 2006

Spring 2006

• Top Graduate Student: Adam Marcus.
• Best Phd Thesis: Rafal Komendarczyk and Serguei Norine.
• Outstanding Teaching Assistants: Christel Hohenegger and Torsten Inkmann.
• Festa Fellowship: Mitch Keller.

March: To all members of the School of Mathematics Community: More great news on the accomplishments of our faculty: Enid Steinbart will receive Georgia Tech's 2006 Outstanding Undergraduate Academic Advisor Award. The award will be presented at the Annual Faculty/Staff Honors Luncheon on Wednesday, April 12, 2006. Enid's extensive and valued role in support of our undergraduate program is well known here in the School of Mathematics, so we are especially pleased that is has also been recognized at the Institute level.
Congratulations to Enid!
Tom T.

January: Hello All: Check out the January 17 Whistle and the article on page 2 about Tom Morley and our K-12 efforts. Tom is teaching a third semester calculus class here on our campus and has 34 high school students from 5 different schools enrolled in his class through distance learning. This is a pilot project partnering with Fulton County schools. The distance learning approach makes good sense and enables us to serve talented high school students who have taken everything their respective schools have to offer.
Kudos to Tom M!
William T. Trotter, Chair

January: Colleagues: I am pleased to report that Evans Harrell has been named as one of two recipients for the Geoffrey G. Eichholz Teaching Award. This award is intended to recognize faculty for excellence in teaching core undergraduate courses in the sciences, mathematics, humanities and social sciences. The prize consists of a $5,000/year salary supplement for three years. The Eichholz prize was established two years ago, and Evans joins Michael Loss as one of the first recipients. Hearty congratulations to Evans!
Tom T.

Fall 2005

• Rena Brakebill
• Klara Grodzinsky
• Cathy Jacobson

October 19: Congratulations to Robin Thomas for being invited to give a 45 minute section lecture (Combinatorics) at the 2006 International Congress of Mathematicians in 2006. See www.icm2006.org/

October 1: Konstantin Mischaikow's mathematics has been energized to the tune of $1 million. The Georgia Tech professor believes mathematics is the key to production of clean energy, manufacturing of ever-smaller computer chips and development of nanomaterials. Read more.

Spring 2005

Please contact Alan Michaels, the Pi Mu Epsilon's President, at alan.michaels[at]analogcomputing.com if you have any questions.

More kudos for Math Folks:

Leonid Bunimovich was awarded a Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award by the Alexander von Homboldt Foundation in Germany. He was also named a Fellow of the Institute of Physics.

I am pleased to report that our colleague Serge Guillas is a member of a multi-disciplinary research team that has just received the 2005 Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award from the EPA. This award is intended to recognize exceptional leadership, personal dedication, and technical achievements in protecting the Earth's stratospheric ozone layer. Since its inception in 1990, this award has been presented to 477 individuals, organizations and teams from 40 different countries. Serge's research team is known informally as the "Tiger Team". Membership has evolved over time as projects are started and completed. Here is a full listing of the Tiger Team as it stood earlier this year.

Our IT team headed by Lew Lefton, Diego Remolina and Justin Filoseta has just received the 2005 Georgia Tech Best Practices Challenge Award. The Office of Information Technology (OIT) was the runner-up. Check out the web page at: www.training.gatech.edu/BP/showcase2005.htm and scan to the bottom for more information. Diego is now heading up the IT operations for IBB, so the great work of this group will be more broadly spread across the campus.
Tom T.

One of our undergraduate students, Steven Lansel, has just received the Sigma Xi Award for Undergraduate Research. He is well deserving of this honor. Congratulations to Steven and his research advisors, Mason and Lyonia, as well as all of you who take the effort to make our undergraduate research program one of the best in the institute, for the outstanding job!
Yang

Michael Loss has been chosen as one of the inaugural recipients for an honorarium from the Eichholz Faculty Teaching Fund. Honorariums from this Teaching Fund will be annual salary supplements that recognize tenured or tenure-track professors based upon a long-term contribution to undergraduate teaching at Georgia Tech and for their primary focus on undergraduate education in the later stages of their career. For the full story, see the January 18 Whistle.

Fall 2004

1. Christian Houdré has been named a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics. Professor Houdré received the award for his outstanding work in the theories and applications of non-stationary, non-Gaussian processes, wavelet transforms, and isoperimetric inequalities. Each Fellow nominee is assessed by a committee of his/her peers for the award. In 2004, after reviewing 37 nominations, 12 were selected for Fellowship. Created in 1933, the Institute of Mathematical Statistics is a member organization which fosters the development and dissemination of the theory and applications of statistics and probability. The IMS has 3800 active members throughout the world. Approximately 10% of the IMS membership has earned the status of fellowship.
   A copy of the official notification is attached. Congrats to Christian!
2. The September 2004 issue of the Notices of the AMS prominently features the work of Peter Mucha, Mason Porter and Thomas Callaghan. This is a fantastic example of "vertical integration" as it involves a collaboration between a faculty member, a VIGRE postdoc and a Georgia Tech undergrad. Kudos to all three! A copy of the Notices article is also attached as a pdf file.
3. Jeff Steif, now at Chalmers, recently was awarded the Goran Gustafsson Prize in mathematics for his work in "probability theory and ergodic theory and their applications" by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. The award, which is given out every year in each of mathematics, physics, chemistry, molecular biology and medicine to a Swedish university scientist consists of a personal prize of 100,000 Sek and a grant for 4.5 million Sek. We continue to follow Jeff's accomplishments and congratulate him on his latest achievement. Perhaps one day, the cold weather of Sweden plus the warm and friendly environs of Atlanta and Georgia Tech will prompt Jeff to come back to the School of Mathematics. Regardless, we celebrate this great news and wish Jeff and his family continued happiness.
4. Liang Peng has just received a Humboldt Fellowship, which will support a 6 month's stay in Germany within the next year. Incidentally, as most of you know, Liang got a 3 year NSF grant this past spring. Subsequently, he was informed that the NSA was prepared to fund him as well.
5. Hao-Min Zhou has just received a 3 year NSF grant. This is great news for our young colleague just starting his second year at Georgia Tech.
   Congratulations to Liang and Hao-Min!
6. Check out the April 2004 issue of the Journal of Dynamics and Differential Equations! This issue is the first of three dedicated to our colleague Shui-Nee Chow and includes articles by a number of leading figures in this field. You may also enjoy reading the short biography written by Jack Hale.
   Congratulations to Shui-Nee!

Spring 2004

Spring 2004, March 20

By any measure, this was an outstanding success. A great deal of the effort to organize this large event fell to Alan Michaels, graduate student and president of Pi Mu Epsilon.

Also making very substantial contributions are the other officers of PME, Stephanie Bent, Patty Pichardo, as well as Rena Brakebill, Yang Wang, and Annette Rohrs. I am sure there are some that I am missing, my apologies to them in advance. As well, a large number of undergraduates, graduate students and professors contributed time to talk to the parents and teachers, and administer and grade exams.
--Michael Lacey
An interesting write-up

Fall 2003

Congrats on Technology Fee Award: Colleagues: I am pleased to report that the School of Mathematics will be rolling out a new computer lab next spring, literally. Thanks to an award of student technology fee funds to a proposal with Peter Mucha, Lew Lefton, Shui-Nee Chow and Yang Wang as PI's, the School will be building a mobile wireless computer lab. The lab will consist of a rolling cart equipped with 32 laptops running Linux, a wireless router, a projector, and a color printer. The mobile lab can temporarily convert any classroom into a state-of-the-art computing lab! Thanks and congratulations to Peter, Lew, Shui-Nee and Yang for their efforts.       Tom T.

Summer 2003

Please join me in congratulating Tom Morley and Rena Brakebill who have been recognized by the Student Ambassadors program: Tom's award is "most likely to win a Nobel prize" while Rena's is "go the extra mile." It speaks well of our colleagues and the School of Mathematics when Georgia Tech students single them out for such recognition. Good work, Tom and Rena!!     William T. Trotter, Chair

Spring 2003

Spring 2002

Previous Recipients of the ANAK Award
2002 -- L. Rena Brakebill, Professor of Mathematics
1982 -- Marvin S. Sledd, Regents' Professor of Mathematics
1950 -- David M. Smith, Professor and Director of Mathematics