Abel MathRoom

     Dear Colleague,

   This is the second announcement for the 15-th conference of the 
 International Linear Algebra Society (ILAS), that will be held in 
 Cancun, Mexico, from  June 16 to June 20, 2008.
  The program includes invited plenary lectures, mini-symposia, and 
 contributed talks.

 Plenary speakers:
  Albrecht Boettcher, Froilan Dopico, Heike Fassbender,
  Luca Gemignani, Leslie Hogben, Erxiong Jiang, Daniel Kressner,
  James Nagy, Juan Manuel Pe~na, Peter Rosenthal, Naomi Shaked-Monderer,
  Ilya Spitkovsky, and Paul Van Dooren. 

 Mini-symposia:
  Combinatorial Matrix Theory.
  Eigenproblems: Theory and computation.
  Implementation and application issues in regularizing
    least squares and total least squares.
  Linear Algebra Education.
  Linear Algebra in Model Reduction.
  Matrix functions and matrix equations.
  Max Algebra.
  Nonnegative and eventually nonnegative matrices.

 Conference venue: Westin Resort and Spa, Cancun.

 Deadlines: 
  Abstract submission, April 14, 2008.
  Payment of discounted registration fee, April 14, 2008.
  Online registration, May 14, 2008.
  Hotel reservation, May 15, 2008.
  Submission of papers for the Conference Proceedings, October 1, 2008.

  The ILAS-08 website:  
                http://star.izt.uam.mx/ILAS08 
  contains additional information, on-line registration and abstract 
  submission forms, and a link to the hotel reservations web-page.
 
  For information about ILAS and the past conferences see the ILAS
  Information Center home-page:  http://www.ilasic.math.uregina.ca/iic/

  We look forward to meeting you in Cancun,
        The Organizing Committee

IMU-Net 27: January 2008

A Bimonthly Email Newsletter from the International Mathematical Union
Editor: Mireille Chaleyat-Maurel, University Paris Descartes, Paris, France

CONTENTS

1. Editorial
2. News from IMU
3. IMU on the Web
4. ICM 2010 Web site
5. ICMI News, the new Newsletter from ICMI
6. ICME-11 and ICME-12
7. Subscribing to IMU-Net

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. EDITORIAL

Among other activities, International Congresses of Mathematicians
(ICM) are the most important activity supported and assisted by the
International Mathematical Union. Needless to say, every ICM should
reflect the best work of mathematics being carried out in the world -
this has been a significant feature and a strong tradition of ICMs. At
the same time we must ensure that the ICMs should present the best
work being carried out in all mathematical subfields and in different
regions of the world.  By doing this, the ICM is indeed recognized as
the highest academic festival of mathematicians all over the world.
But, the significance of the ICMs is not confined to this, it gives
also an important opportunity to highlight the beauty, the influence,
and the power of mathematics to the whole society, which in turn
brings big impact for the further development of mathematics. The 15th
General Assembly in Santiago de Compostela in 2006 approved new PC/OC
guidelines that describe the roles of the various parties involved in
the preparation
of the scientific program of an ICM, and the Executive Committee was
charged with the task of upgrading the Guidelines whenever
appropriate. In the current version of the guidelines, endorsed by the
IMU EC on November 21, 2007, the purpose of ICMs is described as
follows:
"International Congresses of Mathematicians are the most important IMU
activity and need correspondingly careful preparation. Every ICM
should reflect the current activity of mathematics in the world,
present the best work being carried out in all mathematical subfields
and different regions of the world, and thus, point to the future of
mathematics. The invited speakers at an ICM should be mathematicians
of the highest quality who are able to present current research to a
broad mathematical audience."
The details of the current version of the guidelines for the Program
Committee and the Organizing Committee can be found at the IMU website
http://www.mathunion.org/ICM/PC/

Zhi-Ming Ma
Vice President, IMU Executive Committee

------------------------------------------------------------------------

2. NEWS FROM IMU

- Colombia is a new member of IMU, as of 1st January 2008.

- The IMU Executive Committee will have its annual meeting
on 20 and 21 April 2008 in Budapest (Hungary). Requests that
need EC decisions should be sent to Martin Groetschel, Secretary of
IMU (secretary@mathunion.org) by the end of February 2008.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

3. IMU ON THE WEB: DIGITAL FEEDBACK

The remarks "Digital Downside" of the previous IMU on the Web provided
an unusual volume of feedback. For example, Stevan Harnad of the
American Scientist Open Access Forum supplied comments explaining that
Open Access comes in colours, specifically green and gold, the colours
sported by Australia's representative teams. I recommend googling the
Forum and studying its discussions.

For full details amplifying this and the remarks below see
http://www.ceic.math.ca/News/IMUonWeb.shtml#CEIC24

Mention of "Journal and Conference scams" led a reader to suggest I
also issue a warning to respectable conference organisers. In brief,
there is strong anecdotal evidence (instanced in the case of ICM2006)
of persons claiming to intend to attend a conference and seeking a
formal letter of invitation; yet their purpose likely is solely to
obtain an entry visa to the host nation.

CEIC 1998-2008

The International Mathematical Union's Committee on Electronic Information
and Communication was created at the behest of the Dresden Quadrennial
Assembly of the IMU, in 1998 and now commences its tenth year. It
should be no secret that a primary purpose of the CEIC was to advise
on the matter of journal prices. Its first formally endorsed
recommendation was one we spoke of as "Personal Collected Works" and
that officially became a "Call to All Mathematicians to Make
Publications Electronically Available".

Alf van der Poorten (alf AT maths.usyd.edu.au), member of the CEIC.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

4. ICM 2010 WEB SITE

The ICM 2010 Website has been started. It will be constantly updated,
giving relevant information as and when it becomes available.
The web address is:
http://www.icm2010.org.in

------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. ICMI NEWS, THE NEW NEWSLETTER FROM ICMI

ICMI (International Commission on Mathematical Instruction, an
official commission of IMU), launched last December the first issueof
its bimonthly email newsletter with the name ICMI News. This
newsletter aims at improving communication between ICMI and the
worldwide community interested in mathematics education, informing
about actions and recommendations of ICMI, highlighting issues that
are under discussion, and reporting about ongoing activities. In
addition, ICMI News will report on major activities by the ICMI
Affiliated Study Groups (HPM, PME, IOWME, WFNMC and ICTMA), on major
international events related to mathematics education and on other
topics of general interest to the community of educational
researchers, curriculum designers, educational policy makers, teachers
of mathematics, mathematicians, mathematics educators, and others
interested in mathematical education around the world.

The first issue of ICMI News included, among other items, updated
information about the 11th International Congress on Mathematical
Education (ICME -11) and about ICMI Study 18 - Statistics Education in
School Mathematics: Challenges for Teaching and Teacher Education.
ICMI News reported on the first meeting of the current Executive
Committee of ICMI, included a calendar of events of interest to the
ICMI community, and featured a historical vignette about the Swiss
mathematician Henri Fehr (1870-1954), the first secretary general of
ICMI, who played a very important role in the international
cooperation in mathematics education for more than 50
years.

If you are interested in subscribing to ICMI News, there are two ways
to do it:
1. Click on http://www.mathunion.org/ICMI/Mailinglist with a Web browser
and go to the "Subscribe" button to subscribe to ICMI News online.

2. Send an e-mail to icmi-news-request@mathunion.org with the Subject-line:
Subject: subscribe

Jaime Carvalho e Silva, Editor of ICMI News

------------------------------------------------------------------------

6. INTERNATIONAL CONGRESSES ON MATHEMATICAL EDUCATION

- ICME-11
Important deadlines for the Eleventh International Congress on
Mathematical Education  (ICME-11), to be held in Monterrey, México, on
6-13 July 2008, are:
15 February 2008: Submission of applications to the ICME-11 Grant programme
2 March 2008: "Early bird" registration

More information on ICME-11, including a pdf of the Second
Announcement, is available on the congress website
http://icme11.org/

- ICME-12
The site for ICME-12 has been selected: It will take place in Seoul
(Korea) in 2012. The precise dates of ICME-12 will be announced later
and a Korean delegation will be present at ICME-11 to provide
information on the ICME-12

------------------------------------------------------------------------

7. SUBSCRIBING TO IMU-NET

There are two ways of subscribing to IMU-Net:

1. Click on http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net with a Web browser and go
to the "Subscribe" button to subscribe to IMU-Net online.

2. Send an e-mail to imu-net-request@mathunion.org with the Subject-line:
Subject: subscribe

In both cases you will get an e-mail to confirm your subscription so
that misuse will be minimized. IMU will not use the list of IMU-Net
addresses for any purpose other than sending IMU-Net, and will not
make it available to others.

Previous issues can be seen at:
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/Newsletter/archive/index
____________________________________________________________________________
IMU-Net is the electronic newsletter of the International Mathematical Union.
More details about IMU-Net can be found at: http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net/
You can find here, for instance, detailed information about subscribing to
the IMU-Net mailing list and  unsubscribing from it.

IMU-Net 26: November 2007

A Bimonthly Email Newsletter from the International Mathematical Union
Editor: Mireille Chaleyat-Maurel, University Paris Descartes, Paris, France

CONTENTS

1. Editorial
2. Stable IMU infrastructure
3. IMU on the Web
4. Associate members of IMU
5. Schools of Mathematics in Latin America
6. CIMPA
7. Ramanujan Prize
8. Bolyai Prize
9. Subscribing to IMU-Net

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. EDITORIAL

The IMU aims to promote and represent Mathematics at the global scale, in a
world where mathematicians move and collaborate freely across national
borders.
In the past, substantial work and diplomatic skill were employed to try and
bring to the Union's fold countries separated by world political tensions,
and establish IMU as the truly international body it now is. In retrospect,
progress has been remarkable, particularly dealing with the most developed
countries.

But much has yet to be done for the IMU to achieve comparable presence in
the developing world. The 2006 General Assembly (GA), held at Santiago de
Compostela, recommended that the role of IMU in support of Mathematics in
the developing world be enhanced and expanded. This is a different kind of
challenge, and one that is very much on the mind of the Executive Committee.
A number of initiatives are currently under way to address it.

In line with the report presented at the GA 2006 by the Developing Countries
Strategy Group (DCSG), a Committee for Developing Countries (CDC) has been
created with the mission to devise new initiatives of the IMU in developing
and economically disadvantaged countries, to search for funding to support
the corresponding activities, and to establish institutional partnerships
with scientific organizations with common goals. The CDC is to continue and
further develop the programs that have been previously run by the Commission
for Development and Exchange and by DCSG.

The EC is actively promoting applications for membership of new countries,
from all regions of the globe. An important new instrument has been created
by the GA to ease adherence of economically disadvantaged countries: countries
that have never been members of the Union may now join as Associate Members,
without financial dues nor voting rights, for up to 8 years, after which they
are expected to become full members. A few countries have applied under this
instruments, and several others are being encouraged to do it.

The EC is also strongly committed to continued improvement of geographical
balance in the Union's activities, aiming for a more correct representation
of mathematicians working in developing countries in all the Union's
activities, both from the organizational and the academic point of view.

Marcelo Viana
Executive Committee Member

------------------------------------------------------------------------

2. STABLE IMU INFRASTRUCTURE Stable IMU infrastructure

The 15th IMU General Assembly recommended that the 2007-2010
IMU Executive Committee (EC) "studies the establishment of
a stable administrative structure and funding mechanisms,
including possible fund raising, for the support of the
expanding IMU activities, and reports to the 2010 General
Assembly with concrete proposals."

The IMU EC has now started the search process for a sustainable
location with associated suitable infrastructure at which the
IMU secretarial staff could reside for a (long) period of
time, and at which the costs of running the IMU operations
is either low or covered by some long term grant/subsidy or
the like.

The IMU EC solicits initial proposals and recommendations from
interested institutions and organizations for the location of
such an office. Suggestions and declarations of interes are
requested by the end of January 2008 to the IMU Secretary
(secretary@mathunion.org). For more details see
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/CircularLetters/2007-06.pdf

-------------------------------------------------------------------

3. IMU ON THE WEB: DIGITAL DOWNSIDE

OPEN ACCESS
It's hard to argue against having more access to scholarship. On the
other hand, it can be bad if it causes us to ignore the real problems
we face, and it can be tragic if new enticing technology combines with
an irresistible fad to mislead us into acting against our own
interests. Open access has had both affects on scholarly publishing.
When planning for our digital future, we spend most of our time
talking about access (already greatly improved) and almost no time
talking about the integrity of scholarship, copyright issues, foolish
bureaucrats who use faulty statistics, or (worst of all!) avaricious
publishers who have created a crisis in scholarly publishing. Instead,
we talk about access.

BUNDLING OF JOURNALS almost always involves multi-year contracts that
don't allow cancellations or changes. The extra titles are often only
of marginal value to scholars. Decisions about what is purchased are
made at a high level, far removed from scholars themselves, and most
importantly far removed from the individual disciplines. In the end,
big deals make it more difficult for scholars to make sensible
decisions about journals based on price and need. Of course, big deals
give the big publishers a substantial advantage over little publishers
...

WHY WE SHOULD WORRY ABOUT AUTHOR-PAY.  In the subscription model,
users and librarians make decisions; in the author-pay model, authors
and publishers make them. To succeed in the subscription model, a
journal must secure enough subscriptions by convincing users and
librarians that it has intellectual value. To succeed in the
author-pay model, a journal must convince enough authors to submit
papers and then it must accept enough of them to make money. Price
will vie with prestige. The most prestigious journals will charge more
and will attract authors who can pay the cost (grants will help). The
less prestigious journals will discount their price in order to
attract more authors and will increase their acceptance rate. Some
institutions may demand that scholars use less expensive journals;
others will demand that their faculty publish only in expensive ones.
The result will be a distorted
and ugly market, driven by some of the same forces that drive vanity
publishing. This is what happens when a market is driven by producers
instead of consumers.

JOURNAL AND CONFERENCE SCAMS
If you receive an invitation to be involved in a journal or conference
whose organiser's reputability you do not already know, and agree to
let your name be used in what might be a purely money making scheme or
fail to check out the integrity of what is proposed before sending any
money then your bad and misleading example may make you a fraudster ...

... find relevant URLs and more on these matters at
http://www.ceic.math.ca/News/IMUonWeb.shtml#CEIC23

Alf van der Poorten (alfATmaths.usyd.edu.au), member of the CEIC

------------------------------------------------------------------------

4. ASSOCIATE MEMBERS OF IMU

At its 15th General Assembly in August 2006 at Santiago de Compostela,
Spain the IMU introduced Associate Members as new type of IMU
membership. In contrast to ordinary membership an Associate Member
does not need independent scientific activity. It is assumed that an
Associate Member is determined to develop its mathematical landscape
and has the will to become an IMU Member after four to eight years of
associate membership.

Ecuador and Kyrgyzstan have just become associate members of IMU.
http://www.mathunion.org/Members/Associate.html

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. SCHOOLS OF MATHEMATICS IN LATIN AMERICA

UMALCA, the Mathematical Union for Latin America and the Caribbean
organizes two cycles of schools, as part of its efforts for promoting
the development and dissemination of Mathematics across the entire
region.

The ELAMs (Escuelas Latino Americanas de Matematicas) are
doctoral/research level meetings with a long and very fruitful
tradition. They usually focus on one or two grand topics, and include
both mini-courses and seminar type talks.

The ELAMs are attended by students from most latin american countries,
as well as researchers from the region and abroad. The lastest
editions took place in Lima, Peru (1999), Cartagena, Colombia (2002),
and Montevideo, Uruguay (2005). Preparations for the ELAM 2008 are
currently under way.

The EMALCAs (Escuelas de Matematicas de America Latina y Caribe) are
targeted at students at the end of their undergraduate studies, aiming
to attract the most talented to join graduate studies and a research
career. They have particularly strong impact in the least developed
countries in the region.

EMALCAs are organized in Mexico and Venezuela, in alternate years, as
well as in many other countries in Central and South America, attaining a
currently steady flux of 3 schools every year. So far, EMALCAs have
been held in Bolivia (2), Cuba, Paraguay (2), Costa Rica, Nicaragua,
Colombia, and
Peru. As this iniative becomes better known, an increasing percentage
of students come from neighboring countries (support is provided for
land transportation and local expenses of the students).

In all cases, UMALCA provides academic and partial financial support,
while the organizational burden lies on the local committee, that also
provides a good part of the funding. The EMALCAs are generously
supported by
CIMPA-Centre International de Mathématiques Pures et Apliquées through
an agreement with UMALCA. Other international oganizations, including
ICTP, IMU-CDE, PROSUL (Brazil), and UNESCO have also been contributing
to the Union's initiatives.

UMALCA is currently presided by J. A. de la Peña (Mexico) and its
Secretary General is R. Labarca (Chile). R. Markarian (Uruguay)
coordinates the EMALCAs committee. More information on the Union and
its activities can be found at http://umalca.usach.cl.

Marcelo Viana
Scientific Coordinator - UMALCA

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

6. CIMPA (International Centre for Pure and Applied Mathematics)

Appointment of the post of Director of CIMPA: Call for candidates
http://www.cimpa-icpam.org/Anglais/AppointmentDir.html

------------------------------------------------------------------------

7. RAMANUJAN PRIZE

The Ramanujan Prize was established at International Centre for
Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Trieste, Italy, to honour young
mathematicians who have conducted outstanding research in developing
countries.
The Ramanujan Prize is supported by the Norwegian Academy of Science and
Letters through the Abel Fund, with the cooperation of the International
Mathematical Union.

Jorge Lauret (38) of the Universidad Nacional de Córdoba in Argentina
is the winner of the 2007 Srinivasa Ramanujan Prize.
More information: http://www.abelprisen.no/en/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

8. BOLYAI PRIZE

On 30 September 2007, László Lovász, current president of the International
Mathematical Union, received the Bolyai Prize which is
given by a private foundation, founded by five Hungarian enterpreneurs
who wanted to honor scientific achivements of Hungarian scholars,
scientists, and - through the example of the awardees - to encourage
young people to pursue a career in research.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

9. SUBSCRIBING TO IMU-NET

There are two ways of subscribing to IMU-Net:

1. Click on http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net with a Web browser and go
to the "Subscribe" button to subscribe to IMU-Net online.

2. Send an e-mail to imu-net-request@mathunion.org with the Subject-line:
Subject: subscribe

In both cases you will get an e-mail to confirm your subscription so
that misuse will be minimized. IMU will not use the list of IMU-Net
addresses for any purpose other than sending IMU-Net, and will not
make it available to others.

Previous issues can be seen at:
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/Newsletter/archive/index
____________________________________________________________________________
IMU-Net is the electronic newsletter of the International Mathematical Union.
More details about IMU-Net can be found at: http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net/
You can find here, for instance, detailed information about subscribing to
the IMU-Net mailing list and  unsubscribing from it.

IMU-Net 24: July 2007

A Bimonthly Email Newsletter from the International Mathematical Union
Editor: Mireille Chaleyat-Maurel, University Paris Descartes, Paris, France

CONTENTS

1. Editorial
2. Committee on "Quantitative Assessment of Research"
3. IMU on the Web
4. News from ICMI
5. Shaw prize
6. Subscribing to IMU-Net

------------------------------------------------------------------------

1. EDITORIAL

Dear Reader,

The International Congress of Mathematicians will be held in India in
2010, about a century after Srinivasa Ramanujan, a young Indian with
little formal  mathematical training, sent his famous letters to G. H.
Hardy in England.  What a splendid opportunity to celebrate the
universality of mathematics!  ICM 2010 will be the third time the
Congress has been held in Asia, and the second time in a developing
country.  The IMU has been striving to increase the participation of
mathematical communities and mathematicians from around the world.
Currently 68 countries are members of the IMU (out of about 190 member
states of the United Nations). There are many countries, not yet IMU
members, with substantial mathematical activities, whose participation
in the IMU would be mutually beneficial.  Others have written in
previous issues
of this Newsletter about IMU programs to strengthen mathematics and
mathematics education
in the developing world.

In order to encourage more developing countries to become IMU members,
the IMU General Assembly, meeting in Santiago de Compostela in August
2006, voted to establish a new category of membership, that of
Associate Member
(http://www.mathunion.org/Organization/Statutes2006.pdf) .  An
organization of mathematicians in a developing country that has not
been an IMU member may apply for Associate Membership for a period of
up to eight years
without paying dues. An Associate Member country may participate in
many IMU activities, including sending a delegate to the General
Assembly.  More importantly, mathematicians from an Associate Member
country will have the opportunity to interact with other
mathematicians around the world and increase the visibility of their
country in the mathematical community.

The list of current IMU members can be found at
http://www.mathunion.org/Members/continents.html. I hope you, the
reader, will encourage your mathematical contacts from nonmember
countries to talk with their colleagues about joining the IMU. As
Claudio Procesi wrote in the last Newsletter, we need all the help we
can get!

It is a great privilege for me to serve on the Executive Committee of
the IMU, and I am grateful for the opportunity to write this editorial.

M. Salah Baouendi
Member, IMU Executive Committee

------------------------------------------------------------------------

2. COMMITTEE ON QUANTITATIVE ASSESSMENT OF RESEARCH

ICIAM/IMS/IMU set up a joint Committee on "Quantitative Assessment of
Research"

The International Council of Industrial and Applied Mathematics
(ICIAM), the Institute of Mathematics and Statistics (IMS), and the
International Mathematical Union (IMU) have formed a Committee of
"Quantitative Assessment of Research" that will investigate various
aspects of the quantitative assessment of research in mathematics. The
Committee will, in particular, look into impact factors and similar
ways to measure research output.

The Committee consists of:
- Robert Adler (Haifa, Israel), appointed by IMS
- Peter Taylor (Melbourne, Australia), appointed by ICIAM
- John Ewing   (Providence, USA), appointed by IMU.

The Committee is expected to create a summary of its findings to be
endorsed by the Executive Committees of ICIAM, IMS, and IMU and to be
published afterwards.

ICIAM, IMS, and IMU have formulated an aspirational charge to help set
direction rather than prescribe the final outcome of the committee's
work, see
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/2007/Charge-ComOnQuantAssessmRes070521.pdf
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/News.html

------------------------------------------------------------------------

3. IMU ON THE WEB

Spanish Digital Mathematics Library, Vlib MATH, Beyond Escher, Impact, and ...

Our colleagues in Spain launch a beautiful website displaying their
digitisations of a wide collection of major journals.  The DML-E
project offers full-text access to all articles published from 1980
... Because the journals are commercial publications,  their editors
apply a moving wall policy: meaning that universal access is allowed
to the full-text articles except for those of very recent publication.
For articles behind the moving wall (generally those published in the
past year), only abstracts are accessible unless the user has a
subscription to that  journal.

Katharina Habermann reports development of the Virtual Library of
Mathematics of the SUB Goettingen, a portal which will offer search of
and access to link-collections, library catalogs, journals, other
databases, and customised search engines allowing Google to give
greater relevance weight to mathematical sites.

I point to a site of interest to Escher enthusiasts, note the
phenomenon of a publisher of science fiction offering its readers free
access to its back list, and qualify remarks I made at the end of May.

The drive towards more transparency and accountability in the academic
world has created a "culture of numbers" in which institutions and
individuals believe that fair decisions can be reached by algorithmic
evaluation of some statistical data; unable to measure quality (the
ultimate goal), decision-makers replace quality by numbers that they
can measure. This trend calls for comment from those who
professionally "deal" with numbers --- mathematicians and
statisticians.  A small group jointly appointed by the IMU, ICIAM, and
the IMS is preparing suitable such "comment".

... find relevant URLs and more on these matters at
http://www.ceic.math.ca/News/IMUonWeb.shtml#CEIC21

Alf van der Poorten (alfATmaths.usyd.edu.au), member of the CEIC

------------------------------------------------------------------------

4. NEWS FROM ICMI

- ICME-11 FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT
Information concerning the Eleventh International Congress on
Mathematics Education (ICME-11) in Monterrey, Mexico (6-13 July 2008).
See
http://icme11.org/node/12

- ICMI AWARDS
The International Commission on Mathematical Instruction (ICMI) has
created two awards in mathematics education research :
.  the Hans Freudenthal Award, for a major programme of research on
mathematics education,
.  the Felix Klein Award, for lifelong achievement in mathematics
education research,

An ICMI Awards Committee has been appointed. The President of ICMI has
appointed professor Mogens Niss (Denmark) to chair this committee, the
other members of which are anonymous until their terms have come to an
end.

The two 2005 awards went to Professors Ubiratan D'Ambrosio (Brazil)
(the Klein Award) and Paul Cobb (USA) (the Freudenthal Award).
These awards and the 2007 awards will formally be presented to the
recipients at the opening ceremony of ICME-11, to be held in
Monterrey, México, in July 2008.

The ICMI Awards Committee is now entering a third cycle of selecting
awardees for 2007. The result of this process will be known by the end
of 2007. As was the case for the first two cycles, the ICMI Awards
Committee welcomes suggestions coming from the mathematics education
community in addition to wishing this information to be widely
distributed.

Nominations of candidates for the Felix Klein or the Hans Freudenthal
Awards have to be accompanied by summaries presenting the persons
nominated and the reasons for the nomination. Moreover, nominations
also have to include the names and coordinates of two or three persons
whom the committee may contact for further information.

All proposals must be sent by e-mail to Mogens Niss (mn@ruc.dk) no
later than by 15 November 2007.


- A MEDAL FOR H. BASS
The White House named 11 scholars among the 13 winners of the 2006
National Medals of Science, the US highest scientific honor. The prize
recognizes achievement in the physical, biological, mathematical,
social, behavioral, and engineering sciences.
President Bush has presented the medals for 2006, as well as the
medals for 2005, at a White House ceremony on 27 July.
Hyman Bass, past president of ICMI, professor of mathematics and
mathematics education at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, has
received the prize in mathematics and the computer sciences for establishinga
branch of mathematics known as "algebraic K-theory."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. SHAW PRIZE

the Shaw Prize in Mathematical Sciences has been awarded on 12 June 2007.
The Shaw Prize goes in equal shares to Prof. Robert Langlands
(Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton) and Prof. Richard Taylor
(Harvard University) for initiating and developing a grand unifying
vision of mathematics that connects prime numbers with symmetry.

More details on the website :
www.shawprize.org.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

6. SUBSCRIBING TO IMU-NET

There are two ways of subscribing to IMU-Net:

1. Click on http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net with a Web browser and go
to the "Subscribe" button to subscribe to IMU-Net online.

2. Send an e-mail to imu-net-request@mathunion.org with the Subject-line:
Subject: subscribe

In both cases you will get an e-mail to confirm your subscription so
that misuse will be minimized. IMU will not use the list of IMU-Net
addresses for any purpose other than sending IMU-Net, and will not
make it available to others.

Previous issues can be seen at:
http://www.mathunion.org/Publications/Newsletter/archive/index
____________________________________________________________________________
IMU-Net is the electronic newsletter of the International Mathematical Union.
More details about IMU-Net can be found at: http://www.mathunion.org/IMU-Net/
You can find here, for instance, detailed information about subscribing to
the IMU-Net mailing list and  unsubscribing from it.