Mathematical Physics Program

The Mathematical Physics Program in the Mathematical Sciences Institute is coordinated by Professor Peter Bouwknegt.

Link to the Theoretical Astro-Physics program.

People

People in the program include staff in the Department of Mathematics, the Centre for Mathematics and its Applications, and the Department of Theoretical Physics, RSPSE.

Research

The mathematical physics group at the ANU was ranked among the top international mathematical physics groups in the recent ANU Quality Review. Our research interests range from integrable models in statistical mechanics and quantum field theory to string theory, representations of quantum algebras and applications to algebraic geometry. Further information can be found on individual home pages and through the Mathematical Physics home page in the Department of Theoretical Physics.

News

Professor Peter Bouwknegt has been appointed to the ARC College of Experts Mathematics, Information and Communication Sciences (MIC) panel from 2009.

Professor Murray Batchelor has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical from 2009.

Professor Murray Batchelor has been awarded an Honorary Professorship from Chongqing University in China. Link

Emeritus Professor Rodney Baxter's seminal paper Eight-Vertex Model in Lattice Statistics has been selected as the Milestone Letter for 1971 to mark the 50th anniversary celebration of Physical Review Letters.

Professor Peter Bouwknegt to be Y C Wong Visiting Lecturer in Mathematics at the University of Hong Kong.

Emeritus Professor Rodney Baxter's classic book Exactly Solved Models in Statistical Mechanics (cited over 3000 times in the ISI database) is now available as a paperback in the Dover Classics Series (Amazon link).

Mathematical Physics is currently being promoted as a Featured Section of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical.

Professor Murray Batchelor has been appointed to the Mathematical and Information Sciences and Technology Assessment Panel for the Research Quality Framework (Minister's press release).

Professor Peter Bouwknegt will give a plenary talk at the 51st Annual Meeting of the Australian Mathematical Society, 25-28 Sept.

2007 is a MSI Special Year in Mathematical Physics, with a number of events being run Link.

Professor Murray Batchelor has been appointed Mathematical Physics Section Editor of Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and General, effective from January 2007. From 2007 the journal will undergo a name change to Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical.

Professor Peter Bouwknegt co-convened the Mathematical Physics session of the 50th Annual Meeting of the Australian Mathematical Society, 25-29 Sept.

Professor Peter Bouwknegt co-organised a workshop on "The Mathematics of String Theory" from 13-23 July.

Professor Murray Batchelor presented 15 lectures on "The Importance of Being Integrable" at the 2006 ICE-EM Australian Graduate School in Mathematics, 3-21 July in Brisbane.

Emeritus Professor Rodney Baxter delivered the 2006 Lars Onsager Lecture in Trondheim on May 16, after which he was presented with the Lars Onsager Medal.

On Dec 7 ANU mathematical physics honours student Tim Trudgian was announced as one of the eight winners of the 2006 General Sir John Monash Awards for postgraduate research (Minister's press release). On Campus article.

Emeritus Professor Rodney Baxter has been awarded the 2006 Onsager Prize by the American Physical Society for his original and groundbreaking contributions to the field of exactly solved models in statistical mechanics, which continue to inspire profound developments in statistical physics and related fields Link.

Professor Baxter's recent verification of a longstanding conjecture for the order parameter of the chiral Potts model has featured in a Search and Discovery article in the November 2005 issue of Physics Today. Read his online letter Sorting out the Potts models in the December 2005 issue.

The ANU Educational Research Initiative in Mathematical Physics was officially launched by the Hon Gary Nairn MP on Sept 29, 2005. photos, On Campus article.

Professor Peter Bouwknegt joined us from the beginning of 2005. Peter is a world leader in string theory and related mathematics.

Events

We maintain an up to date list of forthcoming and recent events of relevance to the Mathematical Physics Program.

MathPhys - video series

Projects and Teaching

We are currently recruiting honours and PhD students, with a number of Honours and PhD Projects available. We are involved in undergraduate education through the 2nd year honours course MATH2406 Mathematical Methods 2 (Bouwknegt) and the 3rd year honours course MATH3351 Topics in Mathematical Physics (Batchelor) as part of the Mathematical Physics Major. We also mentor and supervise a number of students in the ANU PhB program.