Plus podcast – Maths on the Move

Imagine we could have a digital version of our entire body which could help us, and our doctors, decide what life style is good for us, predict which diseases we might get, and how to best treat them? In short, what if we could all have our very own digital twin? The idea isn't quite as sci-fi as it sounds. A gigantic scientific effort called the Physiome Project is about piecing together a mathematical description of the entire physiology of the human body. Once this has been achieved to a sufficient level digital twins will be a spin-off. In this podcast we revisit an interview we did back in 2019 with Steven Niederer, who was then Professor of Biomedical Engineering at King's College London but has since moved to a new position at Imperial College London as Chair of Biomedical Engineering. Niederer told us about the physiome project, about how the fitbits many of us own are a very first step towards a digital twin, and about how you can model individual human organs such as the heart. We also challenge ourselves to explain differential equations in one minute. You can find out more about maths and medicine, differential equations and mathematical modelling on Plus. We met Niederer in 2019 when he helped to organise a research programme at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge. The music in this podcast comes from the artist Oli Freke. The track is called Space Power Facility. This podcast forms part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from the collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.

In this podcast we hope to give you some interesting information.  This information is encoded in terms of 0s and 1s – the classical bits in your computer or phone.  But what if instead we were using a quantum computer?  Then we'd be dealing with quantum bits, or qubits, opening up exciting new possibilities.  And quantum information theory is the area of mathematics that explores how we can do that.  Adina Goldberg was one of the participants at a recent research programme in this area at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). In this episode of Living proof, our podcast produced in collaboration with the INI, we speak to Adina about her work and how her intriguing motto – "the meaning is in the arrows" – applies to her research, her career path, and the way she looks at life. You can find out more about quantum information in this short introduction and delve into the details of information theory in this collection of content.   Make sure you visit Adina's website to find out more about her work and her fascinating career. Since we recorded this podcast Adina has finished her PhD – congratulations Dr Goldberg! This podcast forms part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from the collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.  

From sunny parks to banquets in castles – come with us on an exciting adventure in Oslo as we join the celebrations for the 2025 Abel Prize!  We meet Masaki Kashiwara, winner of this year's prize, who tells us about the importance of collaborations and creating new things.  Ragni Piene, previous chair of the Abel Prize Committee, gives us a look behind the scenes.  And Andrea D'Agnolo, one of Masaki Kashiwara's most recent collaborators, celebrates his friend and fellow bridge-builder between mathematical worlds.   You can read more about Masaki Kashiwara's work in our article, and you can listen to a recent podcast where we spoke to Helge Holden, Chair of the Abel Prize committee, about the Abel Prize and about Masaki Kashiwara's work.  And can you see all our reporting on every Abel Prize since it was first awarded in 2003 here. Thanks to the musicians  Peter Baden, Astrid Garmo and Liv Lande for playing such wonderful music in the Abel Prize ceremony which you'll hear a little taste of in this podcast.  And thank you to all the Abel Prize team, including Unni Irmelin Kvam, Pål Petterson, Marina Tofting and Anne Lise Stranden for inviting us to Abel Week and for such a fantastic celebration! Photo of Masaki Kashiwara is copyright Thomas B. Eckhoff/DNVA and used with permission

Sarah Hart is a mathematician who is interested, not just in the maths itself, but also its connections to other areas of culture and art. She's done an amazing number of things throughout her career — from research in pure mathematics and heading up a maths department, to being the first woman Gresham Professor of Geometry and President of the British Society for the History of Mathematics.  Sarah has also written a fascinating book, called Once upon a time: The wondrous connections between mathematics and literature, and she gave a talk at this year's Cambridge Festival, with the intriguing title Life in Lilliput – The Mathematics of Fictional Realms. The talk was the contribution to the Festival of the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). Sarah also participates in the Modern History of Mathematics research programme that is currently taking place at the INI. In this episode of Living proof, produced in collaboration with the INI, Sarah tells us about the many things she has done and how they all fit together, and gives some advice for budding mathematicians of all ages: keep pursuing all the things you love doing, and one day it may turn out that they all fit together. To find out more about some of the things mentioned in this podcast see the fllowing links: Sarah Hart: Once upon a prime — In this episode of our Maths on the Move podcast Sarah talks about her book and the connections between maths and literature. Maths in three minutes: Groups — This article gives a brief introduction to Sarah's research area. Life in Lilliput – The Mathematics of Fictional Realms — Click this link to watch a recording of Sarah's Cambridge Festival talk at the INI. Sarah Hart at Gresham College — Click this link to watch Sarah's Gresham College public lectures. This podcast forms part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from the collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.

One thing we all have in common is that we did maths at school. Those of us from the English speaking world most likely also did Shakespeare at school. Do these two things have anything in common? It turns out that they do! Our friend Rob Eastaway, author and Director of the amazing Maths Inspiration project, has written a book called Much Ado About Numbers: Shakespeare's mathematical life and times. In this episode of Maths on the Move, Rob tells us about some of the many instances of maths appearing in Shakespeare's work. He also tells us about the mathematical climate that Shakespeare lived in. Among other things, it included a mathematical revolution, saw music as a subfield of maths, and gave rise to the word "trivial" so much beloved by mathematicians. The book is out in paperback now.   To find out more about some of the topics mentioned in this episode, see the following links: The fabulous positional system is an article exploring the nature of our number system. Rob's Gresham College lecture explores some of the topics mentioned in this podcast and in his book. Maths Inspiration runs inspiring and interactive maths shows for teenagers. Finally, here are reviews of some of Rob's books: The hidden mathematics of sport (with John Haigh) Maths for mums and dads (with Mike Askew) More maths for mums and dads (with Mike Askew) How long is a piece of string? (with Jeremy Wyndham) Mindbenders and brain teasers (with David Wells) How to take a penalty (with John Haigh) How many socks make a pair?

Every now and again, and more often than you'd think, the work of mathematics overlaps with the world of theatre and film. This happened again recently when the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) organised a staging of the play Diving into math with Emmy Noether. Noether was a pure mathematician whose results made waves far beyond her field. Albert Einstein called her a "creative mathematical genius".  The play is produced by Portrait Theater Vienna in co-operation with Freie Universität Berlin, directed by Sandra Schueddekopf, and features Anita Zieher as Emmy Noether. It was put on as part of the Modern History of Mathematics research programme that is currently taking place at the INI and the Inclusivity in the Mathematical Sciences workshop that was organised by the Newton Gateway to Mathematics in March 2025. In this episode of Maths on the move we talk to historian of mathematics David E. Rowe, who provided scientific advice for the play, about the life and work of Emmy Noether, and about what it's like putting mathematics on stage. You might also want to read our article Emmy Noether: A creative mathematical genius. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) and the Newton Gateway to Mathematics. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. The Newton Gateway is the impact initiative of the INI, which engages with users of mathematics. You can find all the content from the collaboration here.

Last Wednesday, March 26, 2025, this year's Abel Prize was awarded to the Japanese mathematician Masaki Kashiwara. The Abel Prize is one of the most prestigious honours in mathematics. It is awarded every year by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters and comes with a prize money of over £550,000. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to Helge Holden, Chair of the Abel Prize Committee. Helge tells us about this year's winner, the history and purpose of the Prize, and how the winners are chosen. He also tells us why good mathematicians are needed in all sectors of science and beyond, and talks about the tragic story of the mathematician Niels Henrik Abel, after whom the Prize is named. To find out more about some of the topics mentioned in this episode, see: The Abel Prize 2025: Masaki Kashiwara - An accessible look at some of Kashiwara's mathematics. The Chern Medal 2018: Masaki Kashiwara - Another look at Kashiwara's work written on the occasion of his winning the Chern Medal in 2018. What are groups and what are they good for? - An episode of the Maths on the Move podcast which explores group theory. Stubborn equations and the study of symmetry - An article which touches one of Niels Henrik Abel's most famous results. Journal für die reine und angewandte Mathematik - Also known as Crelle's journal, this publication is mentioned in the podcast.

The UK government has recently pledged to put around £14 billion into supporting the development of artificial intelligence over the next few years.  But because AI comes with perils as well as promises, careful policy decision are going to be crucial. In order to make such decision in an informed way, politicians need to interact with the mathematicians and scientist who develop AI. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to mathematician Chris Budd who recently went to Parliament for something called Evidence Week, where he and other AI researchers talked with MPs and Peers from the House of Lords. Chris tells us about the discussions he had with politicians — about the worrying issue of bias in AI, its promising applications, for example in the medical arena, and also about the fact that AI is built on mathematics. A strong maths education, starting at primary school, is therefore essential if we're going to make the best of AI in the future. Chris is Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Bath, co-lead of the research project Maths4DL, and Director of Knowledge Exchange for the Bath Institute for Mathematical Innovation. He attended Evidence week with a team of researchers which included Yolanne Lee, a Maths4DL PhD student who recently featured in another Maths on the Move episode. The image above shows, from left to right, Dáire O'Kane (Maths4DL), Jenny Power (IMI), Yolanne Lee (Maths4DL), and Alexandra Freeman, Baroness Freeman of Steventon. To find out more about some of the topics discussed in this episode see AI be the judge: The use of algorithms in the criminal justice system Can AI help with breast cancer screening? Maths4DL AI policy brief: Black boxes of AI - watch maths open them This podcast was produced as part of our collaboration with the Mathematics for Deep Learning (Maths4DL) research programme. Maths4DL brings together researchers from the universities of Bath and Cambridge, and University College London and aims to combine theory, modelling, data and computation to unlock the next generation of deep learning. You can see more content produced with Maths4DL here.

We kick off our latest series of podcasts with an episode of Living proof, produced jointly with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). This episode is all about the communication of mathematics to the wider world, which is becoming ever more recognised as a priority within the maths community. We talk to Sara Khan, Communications Manager at the INI, about how this renowned research institute supports mathematics communication. And we revisit our interview with Hannah Fry who has just taken up her new role as Professor of the Public Understanding of Mathematics here at the University of Cambridge As Hannah puts it, "It's really important that people feel that [mathematics] is being done with them, not to them." We also find out about Hannah's own research in her previous role as Professor for the Mathematics of Cities at University College London, and hear about her favourite mathematical moment. To find out more about organisations and events in support of mathematics communication mentioned in this episode, see the following links: The Mathsci-comm network is funded by an INI Network grant and aims to connect those working in, and with a stake in, communicating complex mathematics and data science to a variety of non-expert audiences. The network is run by the Editors of plus.maths.org, Marianne Freiberger and Rachel Thomas, together with Maha Kaouri from the Newton Gateway to Mathematics Communicating mathematical and data sciences — what does success look like? was a workshop organised by the Mathsci-comm network, which took place at the INI in November 2024. Hannah Fry announced her move to Cambridge at this event. The Graduate training workshop for the Mathematical Sciences, organised by the Newton Gateway to Mathematics, took place at the INI in February 2025 and comprised a significant component dedicated to communication, delivered by the Editors of plus.maths.org, Marianne Freiberger and Rachel Thomas, together with 

Last summer we were lucky enough to attend the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM) in Seville, Spain. The Congress sees the award of several prestigious prizes, including the Otto Neugebauer Prize for the History of Mathematics. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to this year's winner of the Otto Neugebauer Prize, Reinhard Siegmund-Schultze, who has worked on and written about mathematicians who fled Nazi Germany. Reinhard tells us about the motivation for his work, how the Nazi regime impacted mathematics and mathematicians, and what future historians might say about the mathematics of today. This content was produced with kind support from the London Mathematical Society.

What is as hypnotising as a beautiful goldfish circling its bowl, but can help you understand the way a virus can spread? The answer is one of the beautiful interactive simulations produced by VisualPDE ! In this podcast we talk to Benjamin Walker from University College London, and to Adam Townsend and Andrew Krause from Durham University, who together created this online solver of partial differential equations.  Such equations describe how quantities change over space and time and therefore used throughout science to describe processes that play out in the real world — from the transmission of airborne viruses to the flow of water during a flood. Ben, Andrew and Adam tell us about their motivation for building VisualPDE and what they can do with it. We met Ben, Andrew and Adam through the Mathsci-comm network for people who communicate maths and data science to non-expert audiences. As you can see by playing with the simulation below, VisualPDE  is a great tool for communicating maths research to non-experts, as well as allowing mathematicians to quickly simulate what their mathematical models can tell them. Adam is also part of the team behind the brilliant Chalkdust, a magazine for the mathematically curious. Why not order the latest issue for a Christmas gift? Play with the simulation! Suppose that lots of people are sitting in a sealed room and one of them is infectious. We'll assume that the infectious person is constantly producing virus-laden particles that spread out around them and lose their potency over time. The simulation below shows what this might look like. The colour corresponds to the concentration or amount of the virus in the air. With VisualPDE, we're not just limited to watching a simulation: we can interact with it too. Clicking in the room will introduce some viral particles to the air, as if someone with an infection had coughed (coughing is actually a lot more complicated and is the focus of lots of research). Try clicking to see what difference a cough can make. Though each cough introduces some virus to the room, it looks like it quickly decays away until we can't even tell it was there. So, does this mean we shouldn't be worried about a cough? To explore this further, let's look at the probability (or chance) of getting an infection, which is related but not equal to the virus concentration. Specifically, we'll look at the chance of catching the virus assuming that you'd been in the same location for the duration of the simulation. With VisualPDE, we can do this by switching to the Probability View by pressing and choosing "Probability". Now for the goldfish. People don't always stay still in the middle of rooms. Unsurprisingly, the movement of an infected individual can have a big impact on the spread of a virus. The next simulation is set up so that the source of the infection moves around the room, as if they were a waiter going between tables in a restaurant, perhaps. The air conditioner is turned off, so that the air in the room is still.   The Probability View shows the build-up of a ring of likely infections as the infectious person circles the room. A quick look at the Concentration View shows their circular path, leaving a trail of viral particles behind them. To find out more about this simulation and how to explore it, go to the VisualPDE site. The two scientific papers mentioned in the podcast are: Predicting the spatio-temporal infection risk in indoor spaces using an efficient airborne transmission model by Zechariah Lau, Ian M. Griffiths, Aaron English and Katerina Kaouri Turing Instabilities are Not Enough to Ensure Pattern Formation by Andrew L. Krause, Eamonn A. Gaffney, Thomas Jun Jewell, Václav Klika and Benjamin J. Walker 

Are you thinking of doing a Masters or PhD in maths or another STEM subject but are worried about funding? Then the Martingale Foundation might be for you. The Foundation's mission is "to enable and nurture talented individuals from low-socioeconomic backgrounds to thrive within world-leading postgraduate study and become STEM leaders" by providing full scholarships as well as a development programme. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to two current Martingale scholars, Alexandra Sorinca and Malachy Reynolds, who have both just started their PhD at King's College London. We met them this summer at Solve for X, a mathematical modelling retreat delivered by the Martingale Foundation in partnership with the Newton Gateway to Mathematics and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI), which challenged teams of students to solve real-life maths problems posed by industry.  Solve for X is one of the activities the Martingale Foundation provides for its scholars. Alexandra and Malachy tell us about their challenges and also about what it's like being a Martingale scholar. We also talk to Chloe Slevin, the Martingale Foundation's Communications Manager, who explains the Foundation's aims and gives useful advice for new applicants. Alexandra Sorinca Malachy Reynolds Chloe Slevin

As a PhD student working with the Maths4DL research project, Yolanne Lee works on the mathematics that powers artificial intelligence. In this podcast she tells us about what she thinks AI will be able to do in the near future, what it has to do with cats and dogs, and how music provided her first experience of science. We also get to hear her play the piano! To find out more about the topics discussed in this podcast see Artificial intelligence and deep learning: Your questions answered. This content is part of our collaboration with the Mathematics for Deep Learning (Maths4DL) research programme, which brings together researchers from the universities of Bath and Cambridge, and University College London. Maths4DL aims to combine theory, modelling, data and computation to unlock the next generation of deep learning. You can see more content produced with Maths4DL here.

We're very excited that Hannah Fry is coming to join us in Cambridge in January 2025. Fry is a brilliant mathematician, best-selling author, award winning science presenter and host of popular podcasts and television shows. She'll be Cambridge's first Professor for the Public Understanding of Mathematics. In this episode of Maths on the Move Hannah explains how her interest in public engagement grew directly out of her work as a mathematician, talks about how she got into maths in the first place, and shares one of her favourite mathematical moments. We were very proud that Hannah announced the news at an event we organised together with the Newton Gateway to Mathematics. It was called Communicating Mathematical and Data Sciences – What does Success Look Like? and took place at the Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) on November 21, 2024. The event was part of the mathsci-comm network which aims to connect those working in, and with a stake in, communicating complex mathematics and data science to a variety of non-expert audiences. The network is supported by the INI — find out more here. Image above: Lloyd Mann. This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) and the Newton Gateway to Mathematics. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. The Newton Gateway is the impact initiative of the INI, which engages with users of mathematics. You can find all the content from the collaboration here.  

We all know what data is: bits of information of which in this age of Big Data we have lots of. You might also know what topology is: the study of shapes that considers two shapes to be the same if you can deform one into the other without tearing them or gluing things together. But what is topological data analysis? And how might it help to understand proteins or diseases such as cancer? We find out with Heather Harrington a mathematician we met at the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM) this summer. Heather tells us how topological data analysis can produce a so-called barcode for a given data set which gives deep insights into its structure. Below are a couple of images illustrating a barcode to illustrate what we talk about in the podcast. We attended the ECM with kind support of the London Mathematical Society (LMS). Heather gave the LMS lecture at the ECM. You might also want to listen to more episodes of our Euromaths series which reports on the ECM. Circles drawn around 20 points in the plane. If the radius r is less than r0, the circles are small enough to not overlap (left). Once the radius exceeds r0, but is smaller than r1, the circles overlap and together form a ring-like structure (middle). One the radius is larger than r1 the circles join up in the centre of this ring-like structure. What you see now is a single blob without a hole. The barcode captures this information. For r 

We love a game of billiards — or at least the mathematical version of it. It's a dynamical system that's just about basic enough to study but still poses lots of open questions. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to Giovanni Forni about chaos, periodicity and the many things we still hope to learn about billiards. We met Giovanni at the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM) in summer this year, which we attended with kind support of the London Mathematical Society. See here for more episodes of our Euromaths series which reports on the ECM. To find out more about mathematical billiards on Plus see   Chaos on the billiards table Playing billiards on doughnuts Playing billiards on strange tables   Here are a couple of academic papers by Forni and his collaborators:   Weakly Mixing Billiards, J. Chaika, G. Forni Weak Mixing in rational billiards, F. Arana-Herrera, J. Chaika, G. Forni.   This content was produced with kind support from the London Mathematical Society.  

As the days in the UK get shorter and darker we continue remembering the brilliant time we had in Seville last summer at the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM). In this episode of Maths on the move we talk to one of the mathematicians we met at the ECM, Jessica Fintzen, who won a prestigious EMS Prize at the Congress. Jessica tells us how to capture infinitely many snowflakes at the same time, the maths of symmetry and her work on representation theory, and why she likes doing handstands. To find out a little more about Jessica's mathematics, as well as her gymnastics, see this video. You might also like to look the following content relevant to topics discussed in the podcast: Groups: the basics Maths in a minute: Representing groups This content was produced with kind support from the London Mathematical Society.

The world is full of networks. We're part of them, our infrastructure is full of them, and there are even networks within our bodies (e.g. made from neurons). This summer the mathematician Richard Montgomery won a prestigious EMS Prize at the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM) for his work on the pure maths of networks, also known as graph theory. In this episode of Maths on the move Richard tells us about an amazing result he helped to prove to great acclaim, known as Ringel's conjecture, and why it's interesting to take graphs to the extreme. You might also want to read this article about Richard's work. This content was produced with kind support from the London Mathematical Society.

David Spiegelhalter, one of our favourite statisticians in the whole world, has a new book out. It's called The art of uncertainty: How to navigate chance, ignorance, risk and luck and published by Pelican Books. In this episode of Maths on the Move we talk to David about the book, touching on a huge range of topics — from double yolked eggs and the bay of pigs, to why it's useful to disagree and why uncertainty is personal. Enjoy! To find out more about some of the topics mentioned in this episode see, When being wrong is right — on the "tell me why I'm wrong" approach Struggling with chance — on the philosophy of probability Freedom and physics — on randomness and free will  

We recently found out why pieces of toast tend to land butter side down. It' because the physical factors at play, including the typical height of breakfast tables and the strength of the Earth's gravity, are just right to allow a piece of toast to perform one flip on its way to the floor: from butter side up to butter side down. The strength of the Earth's gravity is measured by the gravitational constant g, one of the constants of nature. These constants are special not just when it comes to toast. If their values were just a tiny bit different, life as we know it couldn't exist. This begs the question of why — why are the constants fine-tuned for our existence? Some people have taken this fine-tuning as evidence of the existence of a god who wanted us to be here, but there's also another explanation: perhaps our Universe is just one of many, all with different values for the constants of nature? If such a multiverse exists, then the existence of our Universe within it is no longer surprising. It's just one of many. All this reminded us of an interview we did in 2016 with astrophysicist Fred Adams at the FQXi international conference in Banff, Canada. In this episode of Maths on the move we bring you this interview. Adam tells us all about the multiverse and how knowledge about our own Universe can help us to calculate how many of those other universes could be similar to our own. We hope you enjoy it, but if it's too mind-boggling, have a piece of toast.   Fred Adams

A Gömböc is a strange thing. It looks like an egg with sharp edges, and when you put it down it starts wriggling and rolling around as if it were alive. Until not so long ago no-one knew whether Gömböcs even existed. Gabor Domokos, one of their discoverers, reckons that in some sense they barely exists at all. So what are Gömböcs and what makes them special? In this episode of Maths on the move we revisit an interview with Domokos from all the way back in 2009. We were reminded of this interview when we thought about what makes a good mathematical story and the story of the Gömböc has it all: beautiful mathematics, an exciting discovery, a beach holiday, romance (sort of) and even turtles. We hope you enjoy it! You can read the article that accompanies this this episode here. Gábor Domokos

Over the summer we've been incredibly lucky to have been working with Justin Chen, a maths student at the University of Cambridge who is about to start his Masters. Justin has done some great work on how to explain the concept of a mathematical group, and group theory as a whole, to non-mathematicians. In this episode of Maths on the move he tells us how groups are collection of actions, akin to walking around on a field, and why group theory is often called the study of symmetry. He also marvels at the power of abstraction mathematics affords us, tells us about what it was like diving into the world of maths communication, and what his plans are for the future. You can find out more about groups in the following two collections Justin has produced: Groups: The basics Groups: A whistle-stop tour You might also want to read Justin's article Explaining AI with the help of philosophy mentioned at the beginning of the podcast. It is based on an interview with Hana Chockler, a professor at King's College London, conducted at a recent event organised by the Newton Gateway to Mathematics and the Alan Turing Institute. This article was produced as part of our collaborations with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) and the Newton Gateway to Mathematics. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. The Newton Gateway is the impact initiative of the INI, which engages with users of mathematics. You can find all the content from the collaboration here.  

This summer we were very pleased to attend the European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which took place in Seville, Spain, in July. We went to lots of fascinating talks and generally enjoyed the mathematical hustle and bustle. We also interviewed a range of interesting mathematicians about topics as diverse as mathematical billiards and topological data analysis, and we now bring you these interviews as part of our podcast. First up is the eminent Avi Wigderson, who has won many prestigious mathematical prizes, including an Abel Prize in 2021. Avi gave a great talk at the ECM about the role of errors in mathematical proofs. Traditionally, mathematical proofs need to be absolutely waterproof and errors are anathema. But as Avi told us, if you allow a certain level of error to creep in, you can do amazing things. For example, you can construct zero knowledge proofs, which allow you to prove something without giving any information away about what you're proving. And you can construct proofs that even if they're very long, can be checked for correctness by just reading a few pages. Find out more in this episode of Maths on the move. The photo of Avi Wigderson above is courtesy Cliff Moore/Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ USA/AbelPrize. This content was produced with kind support from the London Mathematical Society.  

Is there life elsewhere in the Universe? And how did life emerge here on Earth? These two questions are often considered separately, but answers to one shed important light on answers to the other. In their new book Is Earth exceptional: The quest for cosmic life, renowned astrophysicist Mario Livio and Nobel laureate Jack Szostak combine both these question and find fascinating answers. In this episode of Maths on the move we talk to Livio about the new book. From creating life in the lab to searching for it on distant planets, Livio gives us a riveting whistelstop tour of research into the origin of life, here on Earth an elsewhere. Is Earth exceptional is out on September 10, 2024 in the US and on September 26, 2024 in the UK. To get a taster of Livio's writing (which we think is very good) see a list of his Plus articles. We have also reviewed six of Livio's books: Galileo and the science deniers Why? What makes us curious Brilliant blunders Is god a mathematician? The equation that couldn't be solved The golden ratio

We're getting excited for the summer here but before we all head off on holidays we catch up with Marianne in Spain at the European Congress of Mathematics, and Justin and Rachel in the UK having just attended some fascinating events in London and Cambridge held by the Isaac Newton Institute of Mathematical Sciences and the Newton Gateway. Marianne told us about her recent interview with Avi Widgerson – winner of the Abel Prize in 2021 and the most recent Turing Prize. Justin told us about  how the philosophical concept of causality can help us understand AI.  And Rachel tells us about the surprising phenomena of anti-diffusion and how it links the patterns we see on Juniper, staircases in our oceans and fusion reactors of the future. We'll be back with  more podcasts in the Autumn, but here are some of our recommendations for your summer reading and listening pleasure! Articles: How to (im)prove mathematics Fractal photo finish  Chaos on the billiard table  Podcasts: Tying together black holes, quantum gravity and number theory The murmuration conjecture: finding new maths with AI From clicks to chords  Books: Collision – Stories from the Science of CERN This content was produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society, the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences and the Newton Gateway to Mathematics.     

How we behave can have far greater impacts than just on our own daily lives.  For example who we interact with and whether we get vaccinated affects how diseases spread through the community.  So if we are going to use maths to try to understand such a challenge facing society, we need to make sure we include human behaviour in our mathematical models.  But how do you mathematically describe the messiness of human behaviour?  To find out we talk to mathematicians Kirsty Bolton, Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham, and Ed Hill, a Warwick Zeeman Lecturer  at the University of Warwick.  Kirsty and Ed organised a recent workshop bringing together experts from across maths, data science, life sciences and social sciences to explore how mathematical models can be made more realistic by including human behaviour.  They tell us about both the mathematical and the communication challenges this brings, from the difficulty of learning the languages of other disciplines to the excitement of finding the sweet spot where experts from such different areas can work together to make progress. Kirsty and Ed are both part of JUNIPER, a collaborative network of researchers from across the UK who work at the interface between mathematical modelling, infectious disease control and public health policy, and JUNIPER supported the workshop. This podcast is part of our collaboration with JUNIPER, the Joint UNIversities Pandemic and Epidemiological Research network. JUNIPER is a collaborative network of researchers from across the UK who work at the interface between mathematical modelling, infectious disease control and public health policy. You can see more content produced with JUNIPER here.  

We're very excited to be going to this year's European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which will take place in Seville, Spain, in July! We noticed that mathematicians who win one of the prizes awarded at the ECM by the European Mathematical Society quite often go on to win a Fields Medal, one of the highest honours in mathematics. So to celebrate the run-up to the ECM we've launched Euromaths, a miniseries of podcasts revisiting interviews with Fields Medallists who previously won an EMS prize. This week we hear from Maryna Viazovska who won a Fields Medal in 2022 and an EMS prize in 2020, talking about the theory of optimal transport and how it applies to a wide range of things, from crystals to clouds. You can read about Maryna's work in this article. To listen to previous episodes of Euromaths click here. This content was originally produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.

We're very excited to be going to this year's European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which will take place in Seville, Spain, in July! We noticed that mathematicians who win one of the prizes awarded at the ECM by the European Mathematical Society quite often go on to win a Fields Medal, one of the highest honours in mathematics. So to celebrate the run-up to the ECM we've launched Euromaths, a miniseries of podcasts revisiting interviews with Fields Medallists who previously won an EMS prize. This week we hear from Artur Avila who won a Fields Medal in 2014 and an EMS prize in 2012, talking about the theory of optimal transport and how it applies to a wide range of things, from crystals to clouds. You can read about Artur's work in this article. To listen to previous episodes of Euromaths click here. This content was originally produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.

We're very excited to be going to this year's European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which will take place in Seville, Spain, in July! We noticed that mathematicians who win one the prizes awarded at the ECM by the European Mathematical Society quite often go on to win a Fields Medal, one of the highest honours in mathematics. So to celebrate the run-up to the ECM we've launched Euromaths, a miniseries of podcasts revisiting interviews with Fields Medallists who previously won an EMS prize. This week we hear from Alessio Figalli who won a Fields Medal in 2018 and an EMS prize in 2012, talking about the theory of optimal transport and how it applies to a wide range of things, from crystals to clouds. You can read about Alessio's work in this article. To listen to previous episodes of Euromaths click here. This content was originally produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.

We're very excited to be going to this year's European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which will take place in Seville, Spain, in July! And we noticed that mathematicians who win one the prizes awarded at the ECM by the European Mathematical Society quite often go on to win a Fields Medal, one of the highest honours in mathematics. So to celebrate the run-up to the ECM we've launched Euromaths, a miniseries of podcasts revisiting interviews with Fields Medallists who previously won an EMS prize. This week we hear from James Maynard who won a Fields Medal in 2022 and an EMS prize in 2016, talking about is work on the fabled twin prime conjecture. You can read about James's work in this short introduction and this in-depth article. Click here to listen to last week's episode of Euromaths featuring Fields Medallist Hugo Duminil-Copin. This content was originally produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.

We're very excited to be going to this year's European Congress of Mathematics (ECM), which will take place in Seville, Spain, in July! One of the interesting things that happens at an ECM is that the European Mathematical Society (EMS) awards ten prizes to mathematicians who are under the age of 35 at the start of the year the prizes are awarded. When looking through previous winners we noticed that quite a few winners of EMS prizes later go on to win a Fields Medal, one of the highest honours in mathematics, awarded every four years at the International Congress of mathematicians. To celebrate the run-up to this year's ECM, we launch our Euromaths miniseries of podcasts, which revisits interviews with Fields Medallists from years past, who previously also won an EMS prize. We start the series by revisiting our interview with Hugo Duminil-Copin in 2022, when won a Fields Medal for his work transforming the mathematical theory of phase transitions in statistical physics. Hugo first won an EMS prize in 2016. We hope you enjoy the interview! Hugo Duminil-Copin (Photo Matteo Fieni)   You can read about Hugo's work in this short introduction and this in-depth article. This content was originally produced as part of our collaborations with the London Mathematical Society and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences. You can find all our content on the 2022 International Congress of Mathematicians here.

Artificial intelligence is changing our lives. Many of us use the voice activated features on our phones to recognise, understand and fairly complex speech. Students use ChatGPT to do their homework. And doctors use AI algorithms to help diagnose many diseases from medical data. But how is AI changing the lives of mathematicians? In this podcast we speak to Yang-Hui He from the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences about his recent work on the evocatively titled murmuration conjecture. This exciting new conjecture came about due to both artificial and human intelligence, and reveals patterns in the prime numbers that look like flocks of birds.   A murmuration of starlings. Photo: Walter Baxter, CC BY-SA 2.0.   We were speaking to Yang as part of our coverage of the research programme, Black holes: bridges between number theory and holographic quantum information, held at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences  in Cambridge.  The programme  brought together a fascinating array of experts in black holes and quantum theory, with mathematicians and computer scientists. You can read more in our coverage of the programme here. This content was produced as part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from our collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.

"The 20th century was the interaction of geometry and physics, and the 21st century is the interaction of number theory with physics." This intriguing insight comes from our recent discussion with Yang-Hui He from the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences.  Yang told us an amazing story about the flow of ideas between mathematics and physics, that involves some of the most celebrated achievements in the last century. Yang-Hui He (Photo Rajarshi Maiti – CC BY-SA 4.0) You can find out more about the ideas we discussed with Yang in this podcast in the accompanying articles String theory: A promise from physics and String theory: Convincing mathematics. And stay tuned for the second part of our conversation with Yang in the next episode! We were speaking to Yang about a research programme, Black holes: bridges between number theory and holographic quantum information, held at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences  in Cambridge.  The programme  brought together a fascinating array of experts in black holes and quantum theory, with mathematicians and computer scientists. You can read more in our coverage of the programme here. This content was produced as part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from our collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.  

Mathematics is a creative pursuit so it's not surprising that there are communalities between maths and art in all its forms. In this episode we explore the intersection between maths and art with physicist Andrzej Herczyński and mathematician Paul Glendinning. Andrzej Herczyński Andrzej and Paul were two of the organisers of the workshop Space, scale and scaling in art, which recently took place at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge. We find out about the rich dialogue that can ensue between artists and mathematicians, how maths and physics can help us understand the power of art and how we perceive it, and provide insights into how a particular piece of art was made. The Space, scale and scaling in art workshop was part of a larger research programme funded by the National Science Foundation on the intersection of science and art. You can see Agnes Martin's painting Morning, which is mentioned in this episode, here (though the digital version does not do it justice). To see Jackson Pollock's works, which are also discussed in this episode, go to the Jackson Pollock website. The image above has been generated by AI. Paul Glendinning To find out more about some of the topics mentioned in this episode, see the following articles: Fractal expressionism looks at fractal structures in works by the abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock. The Artist's fractal fingerprint explores Pollock's paintings further. Sine language looks at a song by our musician friend Oli Freke which explores the idea of sine waves, and how they relate to other concepts such as the Western tuning system known as equal temperament and even to ancient Greek cosmological ideas. Fractal music has composer Dmitry Kormann explaining how he brings fractal-like patterns to the very structure of his music, with beautiful results. Restoring profanity explores how the heat equation can help restore damaged art works. Where to stand to look at sculptures uses some simple geometry to find the perfect vantage point from which to take in a sculpture (or painting). To see all our content on maths and art see here, and for everything on maths and music see here. This content was produced as part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from our collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.

One of the most fascinating figures in the history of mathematics was Srinivasa Ramanujan, a self-taught Indian genius who formed a remarkable relationship with the Cambridge mathematician GH Hardy. Ramanujan was interested in problems in number theory, which are often easy to state, but incredibly difficult to prove. One amazing thing about Ramanujan's work is that it still finds applications today, in areas you'd never imagine are linked to number theory. An  example is the study of black holes, those gravitational monstrosities that lie at the centres of galaxies. We will explore this surprising link in an upcoming episode, but for now we revisit a 2018 interview with mathematician Ken Ono (pictured above), who was an advisor and associate producer on the well-known film about Ramanujan, The man who knew infinity. Talking to Plus Editor Rachel Thomas, Ken explores just what made Ramanujan's work so special and the piece of mathematics that is relevant to black holes. Rachel talked to Ken at the Royal Society's celebration of the centenary of Ramanujan's election as a Fellow of the Royal Society. You can also read an article accompanying this podcast, which looks at the mathematics relevant to black holes. For more about Ramanujan's mathematics, and Ken's research into it, see Ramanujan surprises again. To find out more about the Spirit of Ramanujan project, which Ken mentions in this episode, see here.

In this episode of Maths on the move we look at some favourite pieces of maths we have worked on so far this year. From a revolutionary new tile to new insights in topology, and from fooling cancer cells to bringing mathematical research into the classroom, we hope there's something interesting there for everyone.  To find out more about the topics mentioned in this episode see the following articles: A tip of the hat: Celebrating an aperiodic monotile — meeting the discoverers of the hat Contagious maths — bringing epidemiological research into the classroom The mathematics of movement — what do cancer cells, birds, and whales have in common (and can a slime mould be intelligent)? Outraged by not knowing— new insights in topology with Oscar Randal-Williams To find out more about our work with the JUNIPER network of disease modellers see here and to find out more about our work with the maths4DL research project see here. You can listen to the podcast using the player above, and you can listen and subscribe to our podcast through Apple Podcasts, Spotify and through most other podcast providers via podbean.

It's always exciting to have a glimpse at new mathematics and technology as they take shape.  In this podcast we talk to Georg Maierhofer, from the University of Oxford, about an exciting new idea that is only just emerging  – physics informed neural networks  (PINNs for short) – where you add in the laws of physics to machine learning methods.  We have been able to sit in on a number of meetings of our colleagues from Maths4DL (the Mathematics for Deep Learning research group) as they explore this idea.   Georg explains why PINNs are a bit like learning golf, tells us about the exciting opportunities and challenges, and why the key part to developing new ideas is getting the right people together at the right time. You can find more about the machine learning and the some of the work that Maths4DL is doing at https://plus.maths.org/maths4dl, including our recent podcast How does AI work?  and our collection Predicting the weather with artificial intelligence. This content is part of our collaboration with the Mathematics for Deep Learning (Maths4DL) research programme, which brings together researchers from the universities of Bath and Cambridge, and University College London. Maths4DL aims to combine theory, modelling, data and computation to unlock the next generation of deep learning. You can see more content produced with Maths4DL here.

Last weekend our friends and neighbours at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge put on a great event: the Mathematics Discovery Day, part of the Cambridge Festival. Among the may hands-on activities, games and pop-up explorations were the hugely popular, and well-attended, workshops for students delivered by our colleagues Liz and Charlie from NRICH. Our brilliant colleague Julia Hawkins herded academics and volunteers, juggled props and generally made sure that everything went smoothly. At the same time our partners at the Isaac Newton Institute next door hosted one of our favourite physicists: Ben Allanach, Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge. Ben gave a talk called The force awakens: Quantum collisions, in which he explored experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), particle physics, as well as recent research results which suggested there may be a fifth force of nature, hitherto unknown to science. For those who weren't able to attend Ben's talk we revisit an interview with him from last year, in which he explains this intriguing (and if true sensational) result about a potential new force. The image above illustrates particle collisions at the LHC and is courtesy CMS. This content now forms part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). The INI is an international research centre in Cambridge which attracts leading mathematicians from all over the world. You can find all the content from the collaboration here.

Artificial intelligence has made astonishing progress in the last few years. Perhaps surprisingly, all of the amazing things we've seen, from ChatGPT to generative AI, are powered by same mathematical technique: machine learning, and in particular deep learning. In this episode of Maths on the move we talk to Kweku Abraham, member of Maths4DL, a research project which investigates deep learning, and postdoctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge. Kweku explains how machine learning works, why it's so powerful and whether there are any limits to what it can achieve, and the kind of maths he works on every day. To find out more about the topics discussed in this episode, see Artificial intelligence and deep learning: Your questions answered. This content is part of our collaboration with the Mathematics for Deep Learning (Maths4DL) research programme, which brings together researchers from the universities of Bath and Cambridge, and University College London. Maths4DL aims to combine theory, modelling, data and computation to unlock the next generation of deep learning. You can see more content produced with Maths4DL here.

We're now all very aware that climate change is not just a problem for the future – 2023 was officially the hottest year on record ever. And as well as impacting our lives through food security, flooding and drought, climate change can also impact our health by the impact it can have on the spread of diseases. A very interesting group of people came together to discuss this in January 2024. Policy makers, climate scientists, epidemiologists and mathematicians met at a workshop at the University of Oxford to discuss the impact of climate change on epidemics. We spoke to one of the organisers, Helena Stage, from the University of Bristol, about how exactly climate change impacts the spread of diseases, how maths can help and why it's so important to think globally. Helena Stage   You can find out more about disease modelling and epidemiology in our library for beginners, or our work with JUNIPER (the Joint UNIversities Pandemic and Epidemiological Research network). And you can find out more about climate change and how maths can help in these articles and podcasts.   This podcast was produced as part of our collaborations with JUNIPER, the Joint UNIversity Pandemic and Epidemic Response modelling consortium, and the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI), both of whom funded the workshop discussed in this episode. JUNIPER comprises academics from the universities of Cambridge, Warwick, Bristol, Exeter, Oxford, Manchester, and Lancaster, who are using a range of mathematical and statistical techniques to address pressing question about the control of COVID-19. You can see more content produced with JUNIPER here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.  

Could we make the clouds brighter so they reflect more of the Sun's warming rays back into space to keep us cooler? Or make Arctic ice thicker so it lasts longer over the summer? These ideas might sound slightly fantastical, but they're active research areas at the Centre for Climate Repair which has recently become our neighbour here at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge. In this episode of Maths on the move the Centre's Director of Research, Shaun Fitzgerald, tells us more about the Centre's work and its three-fold mission: to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, to remove excess green house gases from the atmosphere, and to refreeze the Arctic. You may also want to read the article accompanying this episode of Maths on the move. For more about mathematics and climate change, see here.

In this, the last episode of Maths on the move for this year, we look back on 2023 and forward to 2024. We talk about some highlights in our coverage of this year's mathematics, and some of the exciting things to come next year. It's a crazy journey featuring breakthroughs in pure maths, the maths of music and Ed Sheeran, renewable energy sources, the maths of justice, and the epidemiology of climate change. We hope you enjoy this final episode of the year and wish you all the best for next year! And remember: no matter how hard a piece of mathematics might be, there's always something in it that everyone can relate to! To find out more about the topics mentioned in this episode see Fermat's last theoem Telescope topology From clicks to chords, the article and the the podcast Creating a low carbon energy network A 60% chance of rain: our podcast episode featuring climate scientist Tim Palmer Climate change and ready meals: Challenges for epidemiologists To find out more about our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute see here, about our collaboration with the JUNIPER network see here, and about our collaboration with Maths4DL see here.  

To help mitigate climate change the UK government has pledged to decarbonised UK electricity supply by 2035. That's a huge science and engineering challenge on a very tight deadline. In this episode we talk to two people who know all about the challenges involved: Chris Dent, Professor of Industrial Mathematics, and Lars Schewe, Reader in Operational Research, both of the University of Edinburgh. Both helped to organise an intensive two week "deep dive" workshop on the Mathematics and statistics for low carbon energy systems earlier this year as part of a longer research programme at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) in Cambridge. Chris and Lars tell us why decarbonising the energy network also resents huge mathematical challenges — and why the effort isn't unlike the Apollo mission that got people to the Moon in the 1960s. You can read more about the topic discussed in this episode in this article. This content was produced as part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI) – you can find all the content from the collaboration here. The INI is an international research centre and our neighbour here on the University of Cambridge's maths campus. It attracts leading mathematical scientists from all over the world, and is open to all. Visit www.newton.ac.uk to find out more.  

We continue our series about bringing maths to the stage and screen by going back to 2012 when we were lucky enough to host the UK premiere of the Travelling Salesman, here at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences, our home. It is an unusual movie: despite almost every character being a mathematician there's not a mad person in sight. Moreover, the plot centres on one of the greatest unsolved problems in mathematics, does P = NP? Timothy Lanzone, the writer and director, tells us about creating drama from mathematics, and we discuss the maths behind the movie. (The sound effects used in this podcast are by jlozano and nemoDaedalus.) You can read more about the travelling salesman problem, P versus NP, and cryptography on plus.maths.org

When you think of Alan Turing you might think of his work breaking the Enigma code in World War II. Or you might think of his work that helped build the foundations of computer science and mathematical logic. Or you might even think of his groundbreaking work in mathematical biology on morphogensis which helps explain animal patterns. One thing we hadn't thought of, until 2013 that is, was that he could be the emotional centerpoint of a musical. The universal machine is a musical about Alan Turing's life and work that was staged in London in 2013. As part of our series about putting maths on stage and screen, we revisit our 2013 interview with the writer and director David Byrne, actor Richard Delaney, who played Turing, and assistant director Natalie York, to find out how you turn such a story, and the maths in it, into a musical. We are very grateful to Dominic Brennan, who wrote the music for The universal machine, for giving us permission to use the track Building The Bombe Part Two from the show.   The universal machine poster detail.   For more information: You can read the original article accompanying this podcast and a review of The universal machine; You can find out more about the Enigma code and how it was cracked in Exploring the Enigma; You can read about morphogenesis in How the leopard got its spots; And there is more on Turing and his work in Alan Turing: ahead of his time and What computers can't do. These two articles also look at the halting problem which is related to the Entscheidungsproblem mentioned in the podcast.

This is the second part of our mini series focussing on mathematics coming to life on stage and in film. We revisit our 2008 interview with mathematician and actor Victoria Gould and mathematician Marcus DuSautoy, who were both involved in the development of the play A disappearing number produced by Complicité. The play explores the fascinating collaboration between the mathematicians GH Hardy and Srinivasa Ramanujan. Find out how theatre can embody, not just the story of the people involved, but also the mathematics itself. You can also read about A disappearing number in this article. To find out more about Victoria Gould's career as an actor and mathematician, see this article or listen to last week's episode of Maths on the move.

Victoria Gould has always known she would be an actor, and went straight from studying arts at school to running her own theatre company. But she eventually had to come clean about her guilty secret - she loves maths - and has since managed to combine a career as a research mathematician and teacher with a successful acting career on television and in theatre. For this episode of Maths on the move, which was recorded in 2008, Victoria told us what it's like being an actor and a mathematician and how those two, at first sight very different, areas overlap. You can also read the article accompanying this podcast, and find out more about the play A disappearing number here. We were inspired to revisit this episode when we met mathematical film maker Ekaterina Eremenko at this year's Heidelberg Laureate Forum. Eremenko's latest film, Solving the Bonnet problem, really gets across that mathematics is a dynamic, and sometimes dramatic, pursuit that can be well suited for the stage and screen. You can watch the trailer here.

In the summer we came across news coverage claiming that scientist were on the verge of discovering a fundamental force of nature they hadn't previously known about. This would be a fifth force, in addition to gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Such a discovery would be quite a revolution, so we went to talk to our friend Ben Allanach, Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge, to find out more. Ben explained the science, gave us his personal hunch regarding the experimental results, and provided a fascinating glimpse into life at the cutting edge of physics. Ben Allanach To find out more about the topics explored in this podcast, see The physics of elementary particles and A brief introduction to quantum field theory. Click here to see all our content featuring Ben Allanach.

How many dimensions are there? We might not be aware, but we are actually used to living in a curved, multidimensional Universe. In this episode theoretical physicist David Berman explains how, and he also dives into the world of string theory which predicts that the Universe has ten dimensions, some of which are hidden from our view. We first published this episode back in 2012, as part of our Science fiction, science fact project. David Berman You can also read the articles that accompany this podcast: Kaluza, Klein and their story of a fifth dimension and The ten dimensions of string theory.

n this podcast we bring you breaking news from the world of topology! Four mathematicians, all in earlier stages of their career, have resolved the long-standing telescope conjecture which explores holes in spheres – of any dimension! The result was announced this summer at a conference organised by Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge (INI). We talk to two of these mathematicians, Tomer Schlank and Jeremy Hahn, to get a gist of this high-powered result in pure mathematics, which is nevertheless wonderfully intuitive. So fasten your seatbelt and join us on a trip into the wonderful world of homotopy theory!   Jeremy Hahn                  Tomer Schlank To read an article exploring the telescope conjecture and for some background reading, see here. This content was produced as part of our collaboration with the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences (INI). The INI is an international research centre in Cambridge which attracts leading mathematicians from all over the world. You can find all the content from the collaboration here.

How is mathematics related to frequency related to pitch? We found out from our favourite music correspondent, Oli Freke! In this podcast you can hear how the music we love emerges from pure mathematical beats.   This podcast was originally released earlier this year when musician Ed Sheeran was in the news  as he was being sued for similarities between his song Thinking out loud from 2014, and Marvin Gaye's song Get it on from 1973. But, given the way we write music to fit into specific genres, is it possible to write unique music with the limited quantity of notes and chords available? After first answering this question in this podcast, Oli has now written a brilliant article, From clicks to chords, where you can see some of the connections between maths and music come to life.    You can find out more about the maths in music in Oli's articles other – How many melodies are there? and Sine language. And you can find more of Oli's music, and his book "Synthesizer Evolution", here! The music in this podcast comes from, of course, Oli Freke! The track is called Funk Off.