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The Oberwolfach Research Institute for Mathematics has long served as a place for mathematicians to gather and collaborate. Senior writer @KSHartnett visited Olberwolfach in the last days before such in-person gatherings became impossible. (Thread) https://www.quantamagazine.org/mathematics-as-a-team-sport-20200331/
To nonexperts, mathematics might seem settled. But to scholars who live and work in the field, math is an unknown continent we’ve only just begun to explore.
Many of us typically communicate with divided attention. Mathematicians, when they’re talking about math, listen intently — as if they were exploring dangerous new terrain and their lives depended on understanding each other.
At Oberwolfach, Autumn Kent of the University of Wisconsin and Yair Minsky of Yale University discussed gluing together three-dimensional manifolds. They approached the task the way you might approach building a treehouse.
In a round of “five-minute talks,” 12 mathematicians raced a timer to convey their research.
After hearing Katie Vokes of the Institute of Advanced Scientific Studies in France give a talk about testing whether certain graphs are “hyperbolic,” Priyam Patel of the University of Utah spoke with her in the hope that she could adapt the test to her own work.
Transplanting an effective technique into a different environment like this is a common way for new mathematics to get made. To do it, mathematicians need to understand what fundamentally makes the technique work.
Near the end of the week, the group returned for another round of “five-minute talks” — but this time, the mathematicians had to explain their research with a drink in their hands.
“Mathematics is more social than perhaps any other subject in academia, which is kind of fun,” said Stefan Friedl of the University of Regensburg and one of the organizers of the workshop.
For more on this story and for ongoing reporting on new developments in physics, biology, computer science, mathematics and more, visit http://quantamagazine.org . (/thread)
