Description of Proposed Conference
During June 25-29, 2002, Washington and Lee University will host the Summer Symposium in Real Analysis XXVI. The nature of current work in real analysis is driven by the exchange of ideas generated by real analysts rooted in one subdiscipline of real analysis but with wide ranging interests. The Lexington Symposium will highlight lectures by both leading experts and energetic new researchers. Specifically, Summer Symposium XXVI will emphasize recent important work in dynamics and fractal geometry as well as some of the achievements of younger mathematicians in real analysis. In addition, we will provide a vibrant forum for the discussion of research problems, and allot prime speaking time to recent doctoral recipients.
Principal Speakers
The four principal speakers have been invited and at the time of this submission, all have tentatively accepted our invitation. A brief description of each speaker follows.
Born in 1954, Chris Freiling received his Ph.D. from UCLA under the direction of Donald Martin. He has been on the faculty at California State University at San Bernardino since 1983, interrupted by two visiting appointments at UCLA. He has been associated with the Institute for Defense Analysis since 1995 and has been an adjenct Staff Member there since 1997. His fields of research specialization are foundations of mathematics and real analysis. He has established a reputation for tackling and eloquently solving challenging problems raised by notable real analysts at these summer symposia and elsewhere. He has worked on real analysis problems involving trigonometric series, differentiation theory, tilings, and integration.
Born in 1949, Siegfreid Graf received his Ph.D. in Mathematics in 1973 from the University of Erlangen-Nuremburg. From 1974 until 1986 he held positions in the Department of Mathematics, University of Erlangen-Nuremburg, except for two occasions on which he held visiting positions at the University of British Columbia and North Texas State University. Since 1987 he has held his current position of Associate Professor of Mathematics in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Passau. His early works focused on measure theory, especially measurable selections. He has smoothly and naturally expanded into research in fractal geometry, examining statistically self-similar fractals, the exact Hausdorrf dimension in random recursive constructions, random homeomorphisms, etc. His recent groundbreaking work in quantization dimension prompts the interest to have him attend our symposium as a principal speaker. This topic of quantization dimension is very timely and full of analysis problems. Additionally, several issues arise from engineering circles. Known for his excellent presentations, there is no one better to present what is going on in this area as he has written numerous articles and a book on the subject.
Alexander Olevskii was born in 1939 in Russia and received his Ph.D. from Moscow State University in 1963. He was awarded the Doctor of Sciences in Mathematics and the Moscow Mathematical Society Prize in 1966. From 1965 until 1991 he was a Professor at the Moscow Institute of Electronics and Mathematics, serving as Head of the Department of Algebra and Analysis from 1988 until 1991. In 1991 he assumed his current position of Professor in the School of Mathematics at Tel Aviv University. In that same year he was awarded the Barecha Fellowship of the Israel Academy of Sciences. He has held visiting positions at the University of Naples; the University of Minnesota (twice); Caltech; the University of Adelaide; the University of New South Wales; IHES, Bur-sur-Ivette; and the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton. In addition to being a principal speaker at prior Symposia in Real Analysis in the United States, Slovakia, Sicily, and Canada, he has given numerous invited addresses, including two International Congresses of Mathematicians (1986 and 1994); the International School on Functional Analysis, Voronez, USSR (1989); the Banach Center, Warsaw, Poland (1989); Conference on Harmonic Analysis, Maine (1992); Colloquium in Honour of J_P Kahane, Paris; Conference on Real Analysis and Measure Theory, Iskia, Italy (1994); the Synposium on Approximation Theory, Budapest (1995); and the Harmonic Analysis Meeting, Obervolfach (1996). Olevskii is known for tackling and mastering difficult problems in analysis. His early works focused on Fourier series with respect to general orthogonal systems. He has branched out into numerous areas in harmonic analysis, operator theory, functional analysis, approximation theory, and real analysis. His depth and breath make him an ideal speaker for our symposia, especially given his desire to encourage and inspire young mathematicians.
It is particularly gratifying to list Professor Olsen as one of the 2002 Symposium's principal speakers for at the 1994 Symposium he was supported as one of the new, young researchers in the field. His contributions to real analysis since that time have been remarkable, particularly in the areas of fractals and multifractals, measure theory, ergodic theory, and probability theory. Born in Denmark and a graduate of the University of Copenhagen, Olsen received his Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of North Texas in 1994, a student of R.D. Mauldin. Since that time he has been on the faculty of the School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. He has written numerous research papers Multifactal Analysis, as well as one textbook and a monograph on the subject. He has been an invited speaker in Scotland, England, Denmark, Germany, and Tunisia.
Funding
The nature of this event, the related high-quality of the program, and the unique location of Washington and Lee University have enabled the organizers to obtain funds from several sources, including:
Specific to the NSF grant are funds sufficient to enlarge the scope of participation to include a larger number of graduate students, beginning researchers, and those whose research interests are contiguous to work in real analysis. NSF funds to support participants will be distributed with this goal in mind and, in general, on a reverse seniority basis.
The Program
The schedule includes hour-long lectures by four principal speakers, several invited twenty- minute presentations, and a directed and refereed research problem session. Time in the program has been reserved for young researchers, and the research problem session has been designed to entice new people to work in developing areas. Research at the Symposium The symposium program will include a directed research problem session on the first full day of meetings, specifically on Wednesday evening from 7:00pm to 10:00pm. Complementary to the goals of the research problem session is our desire to create an atmosphere that is conductive to people initiating collaborations and actively working on research problems. To be successful we must set aside time when participants can feel free to work. A too full schedule can be a severe hindrance to the type of working atmosphere we wish to create. As such, we plan to set aside at least two hours each early afternoon when no formal activities are scheduled.
Participation
We anticipate that Symposium XXVI will attract a broad international audience of about seventy participants from North and South America, Russia, Georgia, Japan, Taiwan, China, India and many European countries. We have set aside at least ten of the twenty-minute presentations for first or second year doctoral recipients. In addition, we plan an active program of support to encourage and enable beginning researchers and graduate students to attend the conference and participate in its proceedings. Indeed, this is one of the main objectives of our fund raising efforts for the symposium. We also plan to hire several undergraduates to work at the conference and to experience first hand the workings of an international research community. Michigan State University Press will publish the proceedings of Symposium XXVI as a separate volume of the Real Analysis Exchange.
Location and Host Institution
The host institution, Washington and Lee University, is an ideal location, physically and philosophically, to hold such a conference. The University's location in the Virginia's beautiful Shenandoah Valley with its many natural and historical attractions should encourage a substantial level of participation. In particular, Lexington offers museums dedicated to Civil War history (Lee Chapel Museum, Stonewall Jackson House, and VMI Museum) and to World War II history (George Marshall Museum). The Dulles International Airport and the Roanoke Virginia Airport provide convenient access to Lexington. Furthermore, the Department of Mathematics at Washington and Lee reflects on a small scale the type of vigorous and substantive research and instructional environment that these symposia seek to nurture. W&L is a highly selective liberal arts college which encourages its faculty to participate and lead in scholarship at the highest levels. The Department of Mathematics has a uniquely talented group of analysts including Michael Evans (pretty darnd good guy), Paul Bourdon, Nathan Feldman, and Brendan Weickert. Since the University will be on break during the period of the conference, all the necessary facilities will be readily available.