News archive

If you want to solve questions with a scientific background during Advent, you should click on the WWU Online Advent Calendar [de]. For children, teenagers and school classes there are several online math advent calendars, which offer a new tricky puzzle every day.

In the research project “inSight – Multiscale imaging of organ-specific inflammation” that receives approximately ten million euros in funding, scientists focus on the question of how the body regulates inflammation in different organs and, to this end, develop a specific imaging methodology. Prof. Dr. Benedikt Wirth, investigator of Mathematics Münster, is involved as principal investigator.

This seminar will further intensify the exchange between the research fields of Pure and Applied Analysis. It will take place Wednesdays, 11:00 am, via Zoom. Professors, postdocs, PhD students, master's students are welcome. The next talk will be held on 2 December 2020 by Joachim Lohkamp: "The Secret Hyperbolic Life of Positive Scalar Curvature". Please contact the organizer Dr. Sebastian Throm if you are interested to join and give a talk.

Prof. Gustav Holzegel, one of the world’s leading experts on the General Theory of Relativity, is appointed to a prestigious Humboldt professorship. The renowned research prize includes funding of 3.5 million euros for five years. At the beginning of November the scientist moved from Imperial College London to our Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science.

Prof. Dr. Leif Döring (Universität Mannheim) will give a talk entitled "On individualisation strategies in university education in mathematics" on 3 December 2020, via Zoom. The talk takes place at 4:30 pm. The virtual tea time starts at 4:15 pm.

Last Friday the virtual "Mathenacht" of our Cluster of Excellence and the "Hausdorff Center for Mathematics" (University of Bonn) took place for the first time. Many participants followed the workshops and lectures via Zoom. [de]

The CRC opening colloquium will take place on Thursday, 5 November 2020, at 4:15 pm via Zoom. There will be two talks: "The Langlands Program" by Prof. Dr. Urs Hartl and "Deformation spaces of Galois representations - and their interplay with representation theory" by Prof. Dr. Eugen Hellmann.

We welcome Aleksandra Kwiatkowska to the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science and the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster. She commenced her appointment as a MATHRIX Juniorprofessorin on 1st of October 2020. She works on the structure and dynamics of separable completely metrizable topological groups.

Prof. Dr. Urs Hartl and Prof. Dr. Martin Hils organize the "Bridging the Gap" seminar "O-Minimality and the André-Oort Conjecture" which connects Model Theory and Arithmetic Algebraic Geometry. It will be held on Tuesdays, 2-4 pm. PhD students and master's students may enroll. The seminar will start in the first week of November. HIS-LSF

Scientists of our Cluster of Excellence and the "Hausdorff Center for Mathematics" of the University of Bonn will show in workshops and lectures (in German) the fascination of mathematics.

31 new PhD students and postdocs from more than 15 countries are currently starting at Mathematics Münster. Welcome! To ensure a good start despite the current pandemic situation, we are offering a new Buddy Programme and various information events.

In September, we organized the first virtual edition of the public lecture series "Brücken in der Mathematik". Around 200 participants watched the livestream with Prof. Dr. Martin Hils and Prof. Dr. Matthias Löwe talking about paradoxical phenomena in mathematics. If you have missed the livestream or would like to listen to the lecture again, you will find the video recording (in German) on our website.

The world - especially the world of mathematics - is full of mysteries. Particularly interesting and exciting are those that yield unexpected results that run counter to our intuition. Such thought experiments are the subject of the lecture "Paradoxe Phänomene in der Mathematik" which will be held online on 29 September 2020, 7:30 pm, in German. The Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster invites everyone who is interested.

Assistant professor Dr. Mira Schedensack held the MATHRIX Professorship until 2019 and, looking back, she says, “The MATHRIX Professorship enabled me, for the first time, to carry out research really independently.”

The first retreat of our graduate school MMGS recently took place in Duisburg. The event contributes to networking among MMGS members - especially during the Covid 19 pandemic. The retreat focused on the participants' personal future planning.

Hermitian K-theory is the study of unimodular forms through the eyes of K-theory. In work of B. Calmès, E. Dotto, Y. Harpaz, F. Hebestreit, M. Land, K. Moi, D. Nardin, T. Nikolaus and W. Steimle, it was recently shown that there is a fibre sequence relating ordinary algebraic K-theory, hermitian K-theory (aka Grothendieck-Witt theory) and L-theory in a very general context. The online lectures of Markus Land (Copenhagen) and Yonatan Harpaz (Paris 13) will focus on these results.

This is a focus programme on operator algebras and their interplay with group actions. In this context we will be interested in amenable structures and their many incarnations, and in rigidity phenomena which typically arise as soon as one leaves the amenable setup.

We invite applications for a MATHRIX Assistant Professorship in Applied Mathematics (W1) and a Associate Professorship in Theoretical Mathematics (W2). Deadline is 30 September 2020. The next application round for PhDs and Postdocs will start in October.

We are pleased that Prof. Dr. Stephan Luckhaus will enrich our Cluster for another year as a Münster Research Fellow. The well-known mathematician, whose research combines various mathematical fields, will contribute to the 2021 focus program "Geometry and PDEs: from theory to applications".

Congratulations to all PhD students of Mathematics Münster who completed their dissertation this semester. All the best for your future!

Prof. Dr. Hannah Markwig will give a talk entitled "Curve counting and tropical geometry " on 16 July 2020, via Zoom. The talk starts at 4:30 pm. The virtual tea time starts at 4:15 pm. Zoom-ID: 91691193801

Mathematics Münster reaches top-rankings (rank 51-75) in the recently published ShanghaiRanking's Global Ranking of Academic Subjects 2020 - Mathematics. Münster's mathematics also scored very well in a national comparison: it is among the top four mathematics faculties in Germany.

In the "Research" section of our website we provide a lot of information about the mathematical research areas of our cluster. You will also find links to recent videos of talks given by our investigators. This new offer should give you a vivid insight into the researchers’ work.

Mathematics Münster now has its own YouTube channel! The episodes from our inspiring interview series "Behind the Science" can now be found there. More videos will follow. Subscribe to the channel and spread the word!

During the PhD and postdoctoral period, the professors are responsible for the scientific content. Dr. Imke Franzmeier takes care of many other aspects that are important for the early career researchers. In the current issue of the university newspaper wissenIleben, she talks about the early career support at our Cluster of Excellence. [de]

Starting in winter semester 2020/21, the new Master of Science Mathematics Münster replaces the previous master’s programme in mathematics at the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science. It will be taught completely in English, offers a lot of flexibility and a broad variety of courses. Application deadline is 20 August.

In the recently published Yearbook of the University of Münster, our spokespersons, Prof. Christopher Deninger and Prof. Mario Ohlberger, and Prof. Nils Jansen, spokesperson for the Cluster "Religion and Politics" since the beginning of 2019, talk
about the plans and perspectives which the two Clusters have.

The German Research Foundation (DFG) will be providing 6.5 million euros to fund a new Collaborative Research Centre at the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science. The large-scale project, “Geometry: Deformations and Rigidity”, aims to develop geometry both as a subject in its own right and as a tool for other mathematical fields. The Centre has been funded for four years and will open on 1 July.

Informing the public, in an easy-to-understand way, about developments and results in the area of research has long been an integral part of knowledge transfer at universities, including the University of Münster. The current issue of the university newspaper wissenIleben deals with faculties and multipliers who are themselves undertaking science communication - for example our Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster.

Meet Mathematics Münster's female professors! In short texts and interviews, you will learn more about their research, their careers and which aspects of being a mathematician they find particularly beautiful.

Every four years, the European Mathematical Society (EMS) awards ten EMS Prizes, the Felix Klein Prize and the Otto Neugebauer Prize. The Felix Klein Prize 2020 is awarded to Prof. Dr. Arnulf Jentzen. Congratulations!

We are participating in the worldwide celebrations in a digital way: Gain interesting insights into the work of our female professors, postdocs and PhD students of Mathematics Münster and take part in the online film event "Secrets of the Surface" about the life of Fields medalist Maryam Mirzakhani.

We welcome Prof Anna Siffert to the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science and the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster. She was appointed a professor of theoretical mathematics and commenced on 1 April 2020. Prof Siffert’s primary research interests lie in the field of global differential geometry and its interactions with topology, analysis and complex geometry.

The University of Münster has decided to divide the summer semester into two phases. The first phase starts today and will run until Whitsun, during which most teaching activities will take place in digital form. The University will re-evaluate the situation before the Whitsun holidays begin. The employees of the Faculty and the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster will continue teleworking from home. Please contact the staff by phone or e-mail.

Scientists of the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster are coordinating the activities of the newly launched collaborative research project "ML-MORE". It aims to help industrial partners develop more efficient catalytic filters by using innovative methods from the fields of model reduction and machine learning.

Due to the corona pandemic, the Faculty buildings including the cluster rooms will be closed (probably until 19 April). The Faculty and the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster will continue their work. Please contact the staff by phone or e-mail.

On account of the spread of the coronavirus, the NRW state government decided today that teaching at NRW universities will not begin until 20 April 2020. All examinations until 20.04.2020 will be cancelled or postponed to the summer semester 2020 (according to the current status).

Happy Pi-Day! Today the International Day of Mathematics is celebrated for the first time. Discover exciting information and videos about the theme „Mathematics is Everywhere”!

Today's International Women's Day is a good opportunity to give insights into our plans for the "International Women in Maths Day 2020". Around May 12th, the date of birth of Maryam Mirzakhani, the first and so far only female winner of the Fields Medal, a variety of activities will take place.

++ Update 18 March 2020: Due to the corona pandemic, the planned internal and public events unfortunately have to be postponed to next year. ++

In order to reduce the risk of infection by the Corona Virus, the Rectorate of the University of Münster is cancelling external, non-curricular events until the end of March.These events of the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science and the Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster are affected: school competition "Day of Mathematics" and public event "Mathematics is everywhere" on 14 March and the Girls' Day on 26 March.

We celebrate the 1st International Day of Mathematics with two events: In the morning there will be the competition "Tag der Mathematik" [de] for highschool students and teachers, in the afternoon we offer a public event in the City Centre of Münster: Using exciting examples, Prof. Dr. Michael Joachim, Prof. Dr. Arnulf Jentzen and Prof. Dr. Martin Huesmann will show in short lectures (in German!) how mathematics shapes our everyday lives. The event takes place at 16:30 to 18:30 in JO 101, Johannisstr. 4.

Girls go Mathematics! The Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster and the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science invite girls to gain insights into university and the work of mathematicians - a short lecture and lunch in the "Mensa" included. Register now! [de]

This week, 79 master’s graduates and 13 candidates who completed their doctorates received their degree certificates. Seven of them wrote their theses in the field of mathematics. We congratulate and wish them all the best for the next steps!

The Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster has been running for a year now. At the Cluster's second general assembly on 29 January 2020, the members looked back on the year’s achievements and set the course for the future.

Prof. Dr. Assaf Rinot (Bar-Ilan) will give a talk entitled "Hindman's theorem and uncountable Abelian groups" on 30 January 2020 in lecture hall M5. The talk starts at 4:30 pm. Tea will be served at 4 pm in the Common Room.

Dr. Dawid Kielak (Bielefeld) will give a talk entitled "Three-manifolds, Thurston's insights and a little algebra" on 23 January 2020 in lecture hall M5. The talk starts at 4:30 pm. Tea will be served at 4 pm in the Common Room.

Prof. Dr. Roberto Longo (Rom) will give a talk entitled "The information in a wave" on 16 January 2020 in lecture hall M5. The talk starts at 4:30 pm. Tea will be served at 4 pm in the Common Room.

The public event on 7 January 2020 dealt with "Geometry, Analysis and Gravity". Prof. Dr. Gerhard Huisken (University of Tübingen) took more than 200 visitors on a journey through 2000 years of the history of science. [de]

Tom Bachmann (MIT) joins Mathematics Münster as a Young Research Fellow and will spend the next two weeks doing research in Münster. He is a young, uprising researcher in motivic homotopy theory and K-theory. Welcome!

Prof. Dr. Gerhard Huisken will give a talk entitled "Deforming hypersurfaces with geometric heat equations and surgery" on 8 January 2020 in lecture hall M5. Please note: The talk takes place exceptionally on Wednesdays, 4 pm. Tea will be served at 3:30 pm in the Common Room.

Prof. Dr. Christian Bär (Potsdam) will give a talk entitled "Counterintuitive approximations" on 19 December 2019 at 4 pm in lecture hall M5.

The WWU University Management honoured the best doctors of the year 2019. The mathematician Annika Bach not only received the title "summa-cum-laude", but also a thesis prize which is endowed with 3,500 euros.

Dr. José Luis Romero (Wien) will give a talk entitled "Sampling and time-frequency analysis" on 12 December 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

If you want to solve tricky questions with a scientific background during Advent, you should click on the WWU Online Advent Calendar [de]. There is also a mathematical question hidden behind one of the doors. For children, teenagers and school classes, the website "Maths in Advent" is recommended. Every day you can find new puzzles for different ages.

Prof. Dr. Michael Röckner (Bielefeld) will give a talk entitled "Nonlinear Fokker-Planck equations and distribution dependent SDE" on 28 November 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

We are pleased to welcome our Scientific Advisory Board. We are looking forward to an intensive and fruitful exchange on past and future Cluster activities.

MM-scientist Prof. Dr. Matthias Löwe is not only an enthusiastic stochastic, but also a writer. He writes poetry, short stories and crime thrillers with local colour. A portrait can be found in the current issue of the university newspaper "wissen I leben". [de]

Prof. Dr. Gérard Besson (Université de Grenoble) will give a talk entitled "Compactness results for non positively curved metric measured spaces" on 21 November 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

Prof. Dr. Wendelin Werner (ETH Zürich) will hold the John von Neumann Lecture on 14 November 2019, 4:30 pm. The title of his public talk: "From Brownian loops to fields". He has been awarded many prizes for his groundbreaking research. The highlight was the Fileds Medal which he received in 2006.

On 7 November around 17,000 prospective students will take the opportunity to gather information at the "Hochschultag Münster". The Department of Mathematics and Computer Science offers a wide range of input. In short lectures the visitors can get a first impression of the study programmes. [de]

The next Cluster Conference takes place from 11 to 13 November. Special note: On Monday, 11 November, 4:15 pm, Laura Grigori (INRIA) will hold the talk "Robust linear solvers based on enlarged Krylov methods and multilevel preconditioners" which is open to all members of Mathematics Münster.

Prof. Dr. Friedrich Martin Schneider will give a talk entitled "Concentration of measure and its applications in topological dynamics" on 7 November 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

The Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster and the mathematical institutes have inaugurated the "Mathematics Münster Graduate School" (MMGS).

Prof. Dr. Bachir Bekka (Université de Rennes) will give a talk entitled "Dual spaces of algebraic groups" on 31 October 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

Prof. Dr. Marc Levine (University of Duisburg-Essen), member of our Scientific Advisory Board, will give a lecture entitled "GWGW theory" on 24 October 2019 at 4:30 pm in lecture hall M5. Tea and coffee will be served in the Common Room from 4pm.

The new postdocs of Mathematics Münster introduced themselves at the Wilhelm Killing Colloquium on 17 October. In short lectures they gave an insight into their field of research.

The conference will take place from 11 to 13 November 2019. The following speakers have confirmed their attendance: Erin Carson (Charles University), Wim Vanroose (University of Antwerp), Stefano Zampini (KAUST), Laura Grigori (INRIA), Eike Müller (University of Bath), Andreas Frommer (University of Wuppertal), Nicole Spillane (École Polytechnique) , Andrew T. Barker (LLNL).

Prof. Dr. Alberto Abbondandolo (Bochum) will give a talk entitled "On short closed geodesics, shadows of symplectic balls and polar bodies" on 10 October 2019 in lecture hall M5. The talk starts at 4:30 pm. Tea will be served at 4 pm in the Common Room.

We offer several PhD and postdoctoral positions in all fields of mathematics related to our Cluster. The evaluation for the current application round will start on 15 november 2019.

Cluster members can use the parents' office while the little ones play next door. In addition, experienced babysitters look after the children during conferences or colloquia.

Arnd Scheel (University of Minnesota) joins the cluster as a Münster Research Fellow. He is internationally renowned for his discoveries of mathematical principles of self-organization, in particular the dynamics of patterns and waves in complex systems.

The first speaker of the new public series "Brücken in der Mathematik" was Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Lück from the University of Bonn. His lecture was entitled "The Language, the Fascination and the Meaning of Mathematics". The topologist gave many entertaining examples.

We offer several PhD and postdoctoral positions in all fields of mathematics related to our Cluster. The evaluation for the current application round will start on 15 november 2019.

The Cluster of Excellence Mathematics Münster starts a new lecture series that is explicitly addressed to mathematical laymen (in german language).

Last week the new Cluster of Excellence “Mathematics Münster: Dynamics – Geometry – Structure” staged its opening event at the University of Münster with a three-day colloquium. From 20 to 22 June, fifteen distinguished international scholars from nine countries held specialist lectures, providing insights into their current research.

Bright lounge furniture, warm light, large blackboards: this is what it looks like, the new Common Room of the Cluster of Excellence "Mathematics Münster". "The room should be a magnetic attraction for all cluster members," said cluster spokesman Prof. Dr. Christopher Deninger at the opening ceremony.

Prof. Dr. Stephan Luckhaus (Leipzig) joins the cluster as a Münster Research Fellow. Luckhaus works on partial differential equations that model physical or bio-medical processes. His main interests are free boundary problems (in general), phase changes and many particle systems as well as geometric theory of nonlinear elasticity and plasticity and applied geometric measure theory.

A great distinction for a mathematician from the University of Münster: the European Research Council (ERC) awards an Advanced Grant to Prof. Wilhelm Winter. The grant is one of the most important in Europe awarded for research purposes.

As different as the term “dynamic” is used and understood in science, so diverse are the research areas of the University of Münster, in which dynamic even plays a central role in the title. Prof. Christopher Deninger and Prof. Mario Ohlberger from the Cluster of Excellence „Mathematics Münster“, the lawyer Prof. Nils Jansen from the Cluster of Excellence „Religion and Politics“ and the biochemist Prof. Lydia Sorokin from Cells-in-Motion Cluster of Excellence explain what they understand by the term in their research.

For seven months Prof. Dr. Matthias Aschenbrenner (UCLA) joins the group of Prof. Dr. Dr. Katrin Tent as a Münster Research Fellow. Aschenbrenners work centers in and around model theory, but has branched into other fields of mathematics, often using results and methods originating in mathematical logic. His most spectacular achievements arising from a long-term collaboration with L. van den Dries and J. van der Hoeven, has culminated in the book Asymptotic Differential Algebra and Model Theory of Transseries.

A decision has been reached in the first funding line, “Cluster of Excellence”, in the Excellence Strategy being pursued by the national and state governments in Germany. In the competition, the University of Münster was successful with two of the three Cluster applications it submitted. The following Clusters of Excellence will receive funding for a period of seven years, with effect from 1 January 2019: “Religion and Politics. Dynamics of Tradition and Innovation” and “Mathematics Münster. Dynamics – Geometry – Structure”.

The PhD thesis of Dr. Barbara Verfürth from the Institute of Analysis and Numerics demonstrates pioneering mathematical work by making her the first person to calculate the connection between materials and their refraction. This fundamental work in the field of mathematics can help later in developing high-resolution microscopes – or in improving sound-absorbing walls, which are important for good acoustics in concert halls or recording studios.

Hours of contemplation, approaching a solution in small steps, and a healthy scepticism towards computer-generated results. In these guest articles, two mathematicians at the University of Münster, Dr. Franziska Jahnke und Dr. Mira Schedensack, explain what mathematical research means to them and what the aim of this research is. Both undertake research and teaching at the University of Münster within the framework of the MATHRIX junior professorships, which were established in 2017 to promote gender equality in mathematics.

After ten years, Prof. Raimar Wulkenhaar from the University of Münster’s Mathematical Institute and his colleague Dr. Erik Panzer from the University of Oxford have solved a mathematical equation which was considered to be unsolvable. The equation is to be used to find answers to questions posed by elementary particle physics. In this interview with Christina Heimken, Wulkenhaar looks back on the challenges encountered in looking for the formula for a solution and he explains why the work is not yet finished.