Graeme Wilkin


Mailing Address

University of York
Department of Mathematics
Heslington, York, YO10 5DD
United Kingdom

Location

Office: G/011
Phone: +44 1904 323844
E-mail: (my first name).(my last name) (at) york.ac.uk
For example, if my name were "Joe Bloggs", then my e-mail address would be "joe.bloggs@york.ac.uk".

CV

Research. Gauge theory, Higgs bundles and quiver varieties.

Teaching Materials.
    Click here for the course webpage from MA6211 Morse Theory (Semester 1, 2013-14).
    Click here for the interactive geometry illustrations from MA2219 Introduction to Geometry.

The Geometry and Mathematical Physics seminar at York is held on Tuesdays from 2-3pm.


Conference organisation
I am co-organising the workshop Algebraic and Analytic Methods in Gauge Theory at the University of York from 4-6 September 2024.

Editorial work
I am currently an associate editor of Journal of the Australian Mathematical Society.
The journal welcomes well-written papers of moderate length that will attract wide interest. More information about submitting papers.

For students.
All students can benefit from Kevin Houston's 10 ways to think like a mathematician.
Careers after university. Here are some useful resources for people considering majoring in mathematics.
                                           Maths careers in the UK.
                                           You can do anything with a math degree.
                                           The CEO of one of America's biggest companies explains why his math degree is more useful than his MBA.
                                           A story about six life lessons from my math degree that have nothing to do with math.
Useful for graduate students.
    - Terry Tao's list of resources on good writing.
    - Ravi Vakil's "three things" exercise to help you benefit from seminars.
Interesting reading/viewing.
    - How mathematics built the modern world.
    - How Taiwan is using big data to fight the coronavirus.
    - Richard Feynman's technique for learning any subject.
    - How to be creative in any kind of work.
    - A great article about mirror symmetry.
    - Another great article about the Riemann Hypothesis.
    - The 2016 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to a group of physicists who used topology to explain phenomena in condensed matter physics.
    - The habits of highly mathematical people also contains a good description of why mathematical thinking is important (even in non-mathematical careers).
    - A beautiful explanation of how to visualise gravity curving spacetime.
    - 7 computer games that help you learn about physics.
    - Braess's paradox is the observation that (counter-intuitively) adding roads to a road network can slow down the overall traffic flow. Why? Here is a mathematical explanation.
    - A cool video of the Escher cube.
    - An explanation of how data analysis was used to solve the disruptions on the Circle Line.
    - A data analysis approach to what makes great writing.
    - Some interesting math talks available on the internet.
    - A video on how geometry came to the rescue during the banking crisis of 2007.
    - An argument against the overuse of statistical significance.
    - An explanation of how Bayes' theorem can be misused. Here and here are very readable (and detailed) introductions to Bayes' theorem.
    - An argument for using Bayesian reasoning over significance testing.
    - IBM put their quantum computer on the cloud. You can access the "quantum experience" here.
    - A famous example of sampling bias in election polling.
    - How random is a random number generated by a computer? These links explain some common mistakes in seeding random number generators.
            - random number generator seed mistakes
            - some seeding problems with commonly used random number generators
    - A nice interactive illustration of the Scissors Congruence Theorem, which says that any simple polygon can be cut into finite pieces and rearranged to form any other simple polygon of equal area. Can you figure out an algorithm for doing this?
    - What happens when you divide by zero on a mechanical calculator?
    - A nice explanation of the usefulness of Game Theory.
    - An interactive example of the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma from game theory.