A National Conference Center

American Institute Of Mathematics, Pasadena CA

Investigators

Abstract

The AIM Research Conference Center (ARCC) will foster progress in the mathematical sciences and contribute significantly to the current and future productivity of mathematicians. Through the sponsorship of focused workshops, ARCC will provide a new venue for research mathematics which will enhance and complement existing conference centers and institutes. ARCC focused workshops will be distinguished by their emphasis on a specific mathematical goal, such as a significant unsolved problem, an important new result, or the explanation of the convergence between two distinct areas of mathematics. Also planned are workshops exploring connections between mathematics and other sciences. A small team of researchers will carefully plan each workshop so as to maximize its effectiveness in achieving this goal. Central to each workshop will be a public website which, during the lead-in phase, will outline the scope of the workshop and provide resources to the participants. Most workshops will last for one week and will feature a small selection of talks coupled with several problem and discussion sessions. Immediately following the workshop, the website will be expanded to serve both as a record of the workshop and as a comprehensive resource for the current status of important problems and results. The website will remain up-to-date through the incorporation of future work and new developments. The collection of all workshop websites will grow to become a comprehensive and interconnected resource for the most important problems and results in modern mathematics. In recent years, mathematics has become an increasingly collaborative endeavor, and many of today's important unsolved problems will require techniques from several areas of the mathematical sciences. The ARCC focused workshops will provide an ideal forum for a team of researchers, working together, to map out strategies, set priorities, work toward a solution, and set in place a framework for progress on important problems. It is expected that these workshops will often lay the groundwork for significant efforts, both by focused research groups and through special, longer term programs at other institutes. When it is operating at full capacity, ARCC will sponsor 20-25 focused workshops per year, each designed to facilitate collaborative progress on an important area of the mathematical sciences. To ensure that these collaborations will be successful, the leaders in each field will be involved in the planning of the workshops. Equally importantly, junior scientists and graduate students will be actively involved in the workshops, thereby ensuring the long-term development of the ensuing work and contributing to the education of new mathematicians. Special attention will be devoted to facilitate collaborations which include women, minorities, and researchers at primarily undergraduate institutions. This will allow for a more effective use of the nation's collective mathematical knowledge and resources. The AIM Research Conference Center's emphasis on focused collaborative research will foster significant progress on important mathematical problems and will be of significant benefit to both current and future generations of mathematicians.