Twitter: @plusmathsorg (followed by 93 accounts on physicist, mathematician, and astronomer lists)
Site: plus.maths.org/content/podcast
39 episodes
2022 to present
Average episode: 22 minutes
Open in Apple Podcasts • RSS
Categories: Interview-Style • Math
Podcaster's summary: Maths on the Move, the podcast from plus.maths.org, will bring you the latest news from the world of maths, plus interviews and discussions with leading mathematicians and scientists about the maths that is changing our lives. Hosted by Plus editors Rachel Thomas and Marianne Freiberger.
| Episodes |
| 2023-Mar-21 • 31 minutes Living Proof: Hannah Thomas – Making data accessible Having empathy with your audience – with all your audiences – is the first step for making your content accessible. Hannah Thomas of the Government Analysis Function explained this in her brilliant talk at the Communicating mathematics for the public event at the Newton Gateway to Mathematics. Hannah's talk was full of insights and practical ideas on how to make all content published online easy to access and use for all users, regardless of impairment, medical condition or disability. Our friends Dan Aspel... |
| 2023-Mar-14 • 32 minutes Living Proof: Communicating from the frontiers of mathematics We are very happy to work closely with our neighbours, the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI), to help explain, celebrate and publicise the research that happens at the Institute. But what challenges does that present? And why should it happen in the first place? Following on from the Communicating mathematics for the public event at the Newton Gateway to Mathematics we spoke to the INI's Dan Aspel about our work in this episode of the Living Proof podcast. You can find all the content f... |
| 2023-Mar-07 • 29 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Tom Irving Here at Plus, we were very grateful for Tom Irving's work during the COVID-19 pandemic. He was the Co-Head of the secretariat of the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Modelling group (otherwise known as SPI-M). One of his responsibilities was writing the consensus statements that came out of SPI-M, summarising current understanding of the mathematical advice to the UK government. We found these incredibly useful when reporting on the pandemic. We finally met Tom when we were both speaking at the Communicating m... |
| 2023-Feb-28 • 22 minutes Sexual statistics If you've ever been lucky enough to meet David Spiegelhalter, or hear him talk in person or on TV or radio, you'll know he tells a great story. And the stories he told in his 2015 book Sex by numbers were fascinating and highly entertaining, as well giving us the tools to critically assess the statistics we read every day in the news. And sex is back in the news as the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles that featured in his book is being conducted again this year. Who knows what stories will... |
| 2022-Dec-13 • 22 minutes What are liquid metal batteries The world needs to move to renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind. The problem with those is that they're intermittent. That's because the Sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow. What we need, then, are efficient ways of storing energy: efficient batteries. Currently lithium ion batteries are being used but there are issues around their cost, how long they last, and their safety. Donald Sadoway Hope is on the horizon in the form of liquid metal batteries. At a recent event org... |
| 2022-Dec-06 • 21 minutes A 60% chance of rain: Weather, climate, and how to deal with uncertainty Will climate change leave the region you live in hotter and drier, or wetter and stormier? It's a question of utmost importance in many areas of the world, yet it's one that climate scientists can't answer. This is why world-leading climate scientist Tim Palmer is calling for a high-performance supercomputing centre dedicated entirely to climate change. Tim Palmer. We were lucky enough to meet Palmer at a recent event organised by the Newton Gateway to Mathematics In Cambridge. In this podcast we talk to P... |
| 2022-Nov-29 • 23 minutes Are the constants of nature really constant? There are some numbers you can rely on. The speed of light, c, is 299,792,458 ms-1. The gravitational constant, G, is 6.674 x 10-11m3kg-1s-2. These are examples of what are often called the constants of nature – fundamental physical quantities that seem to be the same everywhere, and unchanging over time. Or are they? Today would have been our wonderful boss, John D. Barrow's, 70th birthday. And to celebrate him and his work we look at the answer to this question in today's podcast. John D. Barrow (Image cr... |
| 2022-Nov-23 • 16 minutes Stadium maths Amid much controversy, the 2022 World Cup has begun and the action has now moved onto the football pitches inside the many newly built stadiums in Qatar. But how are these stadiums turned from architectural sketches into real buildings? For this week's episode we delve back far into our archive to hear from Paul Shepherd from the University of Bath, an expert in building football stadiums such as the famous Emirates stadium in London. In this interview, first recorded back in 2007, he tells us about what ki... |
| 2022-Nov-15 • 20 minutes Voices from Ukraine: Yuriy Semenov Yuriy Semenov was forced to leave Ukraine, and his work at the Institute of Hydromechanics at the National Academy of Sciences, due to the Russian invasion of February 2022. He found sanctuary in Britain at the University of East Anglia. In part this was thanks to the Solidarity for mathematicians programme ran by the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). In this podcast Yuriy speaks to the INI's Dan Aspel and shares his experience of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and why the work of a ... |
| 2022-Nov-08 • 25 minutes Voices from Ukraine: Nataliya Vaisfel’d Professor Nataliya Vaisfel'd was until recently a mathematician at Odesa I. I. Mechnykov National University. Forced to flee Ukraine after the Russian invasion of her home country in February of this year, Nataliya has since travelled across Europe with her wheelchair-bound mother and their dogs, eventually finding sanctuary in Britain. In part this was thanks to the Solidarity for mathematicians programme ran by the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. She is now a Senior Lecturer at King’s Co... |
| 2022-Oct-11 • 13 minutes Women of Mathematics: Carola-Bibiane Schönlieb Over the summer we were lucky enough to meet some young female mathematicians who were just finishing up their summer research projects with the Philippa Fawcett Internship Programme and the Cambridge Mathematics Placements programme. On our way to the writing workshops we were running with these women, we walked past six inspiring portraits of female mathematicians from Cambridge. These form part of the Women of Mathematics photo exhibition, which celebrates female mathematicians from institutions througho... |
| 2022-Sep-20 • 10 minutes Women of Mathematics: Holly Krieger In this podcast we are very happy to revisit our 2017 interview with Holly Krieger, one of the six Cambridge mathematicians whose portrait is included in the Women of Mathematics photo exhibition. Krieger works in dynamical systems theory, particularly on chaotic systems. In this interview she told us about the joys of learning and conversations with colleagues. Holly Krieger (Photograph by Henry Kenyon) You can find more about Krieger's prize winning work in Dynamic numbers and you see her talk about ... |
| 2022-Sep-14 • 10 minutes Women of Mathematics: Julia Gog In this podcast we are very happy to revist our 2017 interview with Julia Gog - Professor of Mathematical Biology and a very good friend of us here at plus.maths.org. Over the last two years we've been working closely with Gog and her colleagues at the JUNIPER modelling consortium, communicating their work on the mathematical front-line of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this interview, first recorded to celebrate the addition of six portraits of Cambridge mathematicians to the Women of Mathematics photo exhib... |
| 2022-Sep-06 • 17 minutes Women of mathematics: Anne-Christine Davis In this podcast we revisit our 2017 interview with Anne-Christine Davis, Professor of Theoretical Physics. Anne was the first female professor in the Maths faculty at the University of Cambridge. In this interview, first recorded to celebrate the addition of six portraits of Cambridge mathematicians to the Women of Mathematics photo exhibition, Davis told us that over her long career she had seen attitudes towards women change for the better. But as you'll hear she had to put up with quite a lot at the star... |
| 2022-Aug-31 • 11 minutes Women of Mathematics: Nilanjana Datta Last week we started a special series of podcasts revisiting the Women of Mathematics photo exhibition, which celebrates female mathematicians from institutions throughout Europe. When the University of Cambridge hosted the exhibition in 2017, we had the opportunity to interview the six Cambridge mathematicians who's portraits appear in the exhibition about their work and their mathematical lives. In this podcast we revisit our 2017 interview with Nilanjana Datta - now a professor in quantum information th... |
| 2022-Aug-24 • 8 minutes Women of Mathematics: Natalia Berloff This month we had the pleasure of meeting some young female mathematicians who were just finishing up their summer research projects with the Philippa Fawcett Internship Programme and the Cambridge Mathematics Placements programme. On our way to the writing workshops we were running with these women, we walked past six inspiring portraits of female mathematicians from Cambridge. These form part of the Women of Mathematics photo exhibition, which celebrates female mathematicians from institutions throughout ... |
| 2022-Aug-16 • 22 minutes AI, babies, and agency In this podcast, first published in August 2020, we hear from machine learning pioneer Yoshua Bengio, who believes that creating a true artificial intelligence will only be possible once machines have something that babies are born with: the ability to interact with the world, observe what happens, and adapt to the consequences of their actions. Yoshua Bengio (Photo copyright: Heidelberg Laureate Forum Foundation) We'll find out how such agency helps us learn, what it could mean for computers to have it to... |
| 2022-Aug-09 • 31 minutes Machine learning and artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence and machines that train themselves might sound like a plot from a science fiction movie, but these things are already part of our everyday lives. How can a machine learn to distinguish a picture of a cat from a picture of a dog? At the Heidelberg Laureate Forum in 2019, Chris Budd, Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Bath, talked us through the basics of how these learning machines tick. While Raj Reddy, Turing Award winner and artificial intelligence pioneer, t... |
| 2022-Aug-03 • 19 minutes How the velodrome found its form To celebrate the Commonwealth Games happening this week in the UK we are visiting one of the venues, the velodrome in the Lee Valley VeloPark in London. The velodrome, with its striking curved shape, was built for the London 2012 Olympics. In the run up to the 2012 Olympics, we talked to structural engineers Andrew Weir and Pete Winslow from Expedition Engineering, who were part of the design team for the velodrome, about how mathematics helped create its iconic shape. Sir Chris Hoy leads the GB Cycli... |
| 2022-Jul-26 • 15 minutes Maths on the red carpet - Fields Medallist June Huh June Huh has won one of this year's Fields Medals at the International Congress of Mathematicians. The Fields Medal is one of the most prestigious prizes in mathematics. It is awarded every four years "to recognise outstanding mathematical achievement for existing work and for the promise of future achievement". Up to four mathematicians up to the age of 40 are awarded a Fields Medal each time. June Huh. Photo: Lance Murphey. In this podcast, which comes to you from the opening days of the ICM 2022 in Helsi... |
| 2022-Jul-19 • 14 minutes Maths on the red carpet – Fields Medallist Hugo Duminil-Copin Hugo Duminil-Copin has won a 2022 Fields Medal for his work transforming the mathematical theory of phase transitions in statistical physics. Fields Medals count among the highest honours in mathematics and are awarded every four years at the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) to researchers up to the age of 40. Hugo Duminil-Copin (Photo Matteo Fieni, used with permission) In this podcast, which comes to you from a beautiful lake on day two of the ICM 2022 in Helsinki, we talk to Duminil-Copin ... |
| 2022-Jul-12 • 16 minutes Maths on the red carpet - Fields Medallist James Maynard James Maynard has won a 2022 Fields Medal for "spectacular contributions to number theory". Fields Medals count among the highest honours in mathematics and are awarded every four years at the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) to researchers up to the age of 40. James Maynard (Photo by Ryan Cowan, used with permission) In this podcast, which comes to you from the opening day of the ICM 2022 in Helsinki, we talk to Maynard about his love for numbers and groundbreaking progress towards something... |
| 2022-Jul-05 • 22 minutes Maths on the red carpet – Fields Medallist Maryna Viazovska Hello from Helsinki! We are very pleased to be bringing you coverage direct from the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) – one of the highlights of the mathematical calendar. The ICM takes place every four years and it's usually the biggest maths conference of them all, attracting thousands of participants, and also sees the awards of some very prestigious prizes, including the famous Fields Medals. This year's Congress is a little different – it is being held as a fully virtual event with o... |
| 2022-Jun-28 • 15 minutes Maths on the red carpet –Revisiting the 2018 International Congress of Mathematicians We are getting very excited - next week is the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM)- one of the highlights of the mathematical calendar! The ICM takes place every four years and it’s the biggest maths conference of them all, attracting thousands of participants, and also sees the awards of some very prestigious prizes, including the famous Fields medal. We are fortunate to have been able to interview the prize winners in advance of the conference, but that’s top secret and we won’t be revealing ... |
| 2022-Jun-14 • 30 minutes The maths and magic of shuffling We all have our favoured methods of shuffling cards, but most of us don't think any more about it once we've started playing a game. But there's so much more to be discovered! In this podcast mathematician Cheryl Praeger and magician Will Houstoun reveal the maths and magic behind shuffling cards. And as this podcast, first published in March 2021, was the first podcast we produced in collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute, Dan Aspel also tells us all about the INI! You can watch Cheryl Praeger talk... |
| 2022-May-24 • 28 minutes Living Proof: Anita Layton – one of Canada’s most powerful women In this episode we meet the irrepressible Anita Layton. As well as leading a busy research team, Anita also spends much of her downtime fostering diversity and mentorships throughout her networks, and is professionally engaged across disciplines as distinct as applied mathematics, computer science and the medical sciences. She was also voted one of 2021’s top 100 “Canada’s most powerful women”. We are very pleased to host this episode of the Living Proof podcast as part of our collaboration with the wond... |
| 2022-May-17 • 26 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Matt Keeling "We all work with exponential growth and we're really, really used to it, but we are still amazed at how fast things take off at the end." This is epidemiologist Matt Keeling talking about how a disease outbreak can still take you by surprise even if you've been working in the field for 25 years. Matt's team at the University of Warwick has been running one of the main models that have informed UK government on the COVID-19 pandemic. In this podcast Matt tells us about his work on the roadmap out of lockdow... |
| 2022-May-10 • 26 minutes Reducing NHS waiting lists in the wake of COVID Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death for men in the UK and second most for women. During the first lockdown from March 2020, elective cardiac procedures and outpatient consultations were postponed and many appointments have not yet been rescheduled. In addition, those who were suffering from heart conditions did not see their GP or come to hospital. The resulting backlog presents a huge challenge. In this podcast, first published in March 2021, we talk to cardiologist Ramesh Nadarajah and co... |
| 2022-May-03 • 37 minutes Living Proof: Collaborating with the Isaac Newton Institute Have you every wondered about what goes on behind the scenes of Plus? Find out in this special guest episode! We are very pleased to be collaborating with the wonderful Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) in Cambridge. Recently Plus editors Marianne Freiberger and Rachel Thomas appeared on the INI's Living Proof podcast, talking to the INI's communication's manager Dan Aspel. We talked to Dan about mathematical journalism, spreading a love of numbers, and our new collaboration with the... |
| 2022-Apr-26 • 26 minutes New ways of seeing with the INTEGRAL project It's amazing what you can see now thanks to remote imaging technology! Visiting far away landscapes via satellite images or watching live feeds from a famous street is fun, but remotely gathered images offer exciting opportunities to map and observe the world. The problem is that the vast amount of remotely gathered data now available is useless on its own – we need to have the means to analyse and extract information from those images. This is exactly what the members of the INTEGRAL project, researchers b... |
| 2022-Apr-19 • 28 minutes How to predict a changing climate How do you go about predicting something as complex as the Earth's climate? In this podcast — featuring climate modelling experts Emily Shuckburgh and Chris Budd — we explore what those climate models look like, the uncertainties involved in climate modelling, and also why the predictions need to be taken seriously despite those uncertainties. We also look at the simplest climate model of them all— the energy balance model — and explain the famous butterfly effect in just one minute. Emily Shuckburgh is a ... |
| 2022-Apr-12 • 18 minutes Flying home with quantum physics In this week's podcast we reach into our archive for a favourite story we first heard back in 2010! The quantum world is usually associated with the weirder end of physics, including strange phenomena like superposition or quantum entanglement, the "spooky action at a distance" as Einstein called it. But it turns out that quantum mechanical processes occur in living systems too. Some species of birds use quantum mechanics to navigate and studying how they do it might actually help us with building quantum ... |
| 2022-Apr-05 • 25 minutes La La Lab: A tour through maths and music Although people often talk about the links between maths and music, if you're neither a mathematician nor a musician these links might not be that obvious. In this podcast we get to explore the connection by going on a tour of the La La Lab exhibition with curator Daniel Ramos, talk to Jürgen Richter-Gebert, who created some of the exhibits, and asked Andreas Matt about the work of Imaginary, the group that produced this exhibition. We were lucky enough to visit the La La Lab exhibition in person when it o... |
| 2022-Mar-30 • 22 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Francesca Scarabel Like many early career researchers, Francesca Scarabel has moved around the world to take the first steps in her career: from her home in Italy, to Finland for her PhD, to Hungary and Canada for postdoctoral research. Now she works at the University of Manchester as part of the JUNIPER modelling consortium. We spoke to Francesca about what it's like being part of the mathematical emergency response, the importance of local knowledge, and not being afraid to share your ideas. You can read more about the wo... |
| 2022-Mar-29 • 16 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Ed Hill The Mathematical frontline podcast is about the mathematicians who are grappling with the unprecedented challenge of studying a live pandemic unfolding in front of their eyes. In this podcast we are really pleased to talk to Ed Hill, a member of the modelling consortium from the University of Warwick, where he is also part of the Zeeman Institute for Systems Biology & Infectious Disease Epidemiology Research group (SBIDER). Ed tells us about his journey through the pandemic, his contribution to keeping wor... |
| 2022-Mar-28 • 25 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Ellen Brooks Pollock and Leon Danon Like many couples, Ellen Brooks Pollock and Leon Danon, have had to make it through the pandemic juggling lockdowns, child care and work. But unlike many of us, they have also both been working together on the mathematical front line of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ellen and Leon are both both from the University of Bristol. The are members of the JUNIPER consortium of modelling groups from across the UK whose research and insights feed into the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Modelling group (otherwise known a... |
| 2022-Mar-25 • 24 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Mike Tildesley Mike Tildesley is now a professor in the Zeeman Institute for Systems Biology and Infectious Disease Epidemiology Research at the University of Warwick - but he started out doing a PhD in astrophysics, which is far literally and mathematically from studying the spread of diseases. We talked to Mike in July 2021 about his unusual route into epidemiology, the work he's doing on the pandemic, and about the highs and lows of working on the mathematical frontline. Mike is a member of the JUNIPER modelling c... |
| 2022-Mar-24 • 31 minutes On the mathematical frontline: Julia Gog Over the last two years we have done a lot of reporting on the maths of the COVID-19 pandemic. Behind the maths there are of course people — those mathematicians who make the epidemiological models that do (and sometimes do not do not) inform government policy, who are grappling with the unprecedented challenge of coming to grips with a live pandemic unfolding in front of their eyes. Our special podcast series, On the mathematical frontline, is about those people. It explores the maths they do, how they go ... |
| 2022-Mar-23 • 33 minutes Looking back at our first glimpse of the virus: with David Spiegelhalter Today, 23 March 2022, marks two years since the UK locked down for the first time in the COVID-19 pandemic. We relaunch the Plus podcast by looking back to where our pandemic coverage all began, by revisiting our podcast from April 2020. Back in March and April 2020 one thing was on everybody's mind: the novel coronavirus - now better known as COVID-19. In this podcast we spoke to two people who have become very familiar to many of us over the last two years. We reported on our first COVID-19 conversatio... |