Dusa McDuff facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Dusa McDuff
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Dusa McDuff, Edinburgh 2009 (80th Birthday of Michael Atiyah)
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Margaret Dusa Waddington
18 October 1945 London, England
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| Alma mater | University of Edinburgh Girton College, Cambridge |
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| Awards | BMS Morning Speaker Satter Prize (1991) Fellow of the Royal Society Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (2008) Speaker at International Congress of Mathematicians BMC Plenary Speaker Sylvester Medal (2018) |
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| Fields | Mathematics |
| Institutions | University of Cambridge University of York University of Warwick Massachusetts Institute of Technology Institute for Advanced Study Stony Brook University Barnard College |
| Doctoral advisor | George A. Reid |
| Doctoral students | Katrin Wehrheim |
Dusa McDuff (born October 18, 1945) is a famous English mathematician. She studies a special area of math called symplectic geometry. She was the first person to win the Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize in Mathematics. She also gave a special lecture called the Noether Lecture and is a member of the Royal Society. Today, she is a math professor at Barnard College.
Early Life and Education
Dusa McDuff was born in London, England, on October 18, 1945. Her mother was Margaret Justin Blanco White, an architect. Her father was Conrad Hal Waddington, a biologist. Dusa grew up in Scotland, where her father was a professor at the University of Edinburgh.
She went to St George's School for Girls in Edinburgh. Even though the school's math level was not as high as the boys' school, she had a very good math teacher. She always wanted to be a mathematician.
Dusa chose to study at the University of Edinburgh instead of University of Cambridge. She graduated with a science degree in 1967. Then, she went to Girton College, Cambridge to work on her doctorate. There, she studied functional analysis with mathematician George A. Reid. She solved a complex math problem and published her work in a top math journal.
After finishing her doctorate in 1971, McDuff received a fellowship at Cambridge. She then visited Moscow for six months with her husband, David McDuff. In Moscow, she met a famous mathematician named Israel Gelfand. He helped her see mathematics in a new way, like poetry.
When she returned to Cambridge, Dusa started attending topology lectures. Soon, she was invited to teach at the University of York. Later, she moved to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Her math career grew even more there. She then joined the Institute for Advanced Study, working with Graeme Segal. After that, she became a lecturer at the University of Warwick in England.
Around this time, she met mathematician John Milnor. To be closer to him, she took a teaching job at Stony Brook University. She began to study the connections between different types of shapes and spaces in math. She has since focused on symplectic topology. Since 2007, she has been a professor at Barnard College. In 1984, McDuff married John Milnor.
Mathematical Work and Research
For over 30 years, Dusa McDuff has been a key person in developing symplectic geometry and topology. These are areas of math that study shapes and spaces.
She showed the first example of certain shapes that look different but are related in a special way. She also helped classify different types of four-dimensional shapes with François Lalonde. More recently, she has studied how to use symplectic topology to understand how things move in a special way, working with Susan Tolman.
She also worked with Felix Schlenk on how to fit one shape inside another. This led to interesting questions related to numbers. It also showed a link between different types of curves and numbers in math. With Katrin Wehrheim, she has looked closely at a classic proof in symplectic geometry to make sure it is completely accurate.
Dusa McDuff has also written two important textbooks with Dietmar Salamon. These books are called Introduction to Symplectic Topology and J-Holomorphic Curves and Symplectic Topology.
Awards and Recognition
Dusa McDuff has received many honors for her work:
- In 1991, she was the first person to win the Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize in Mathematics.
- She became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1994.
- In 1998, she was a Noether Lecturer, which is a special honor for women in mathematics.
- She became a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1999.
- In 2008, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
- She gave important talks at the International Congress of Mathematicians in 1990 and 1998.
- In 1999, she was the first woman to give the Hardy Lecture for the London Mathematical Society.
- In 2010, she won the Senior Berwick Prize from the London Mathematical Society.
- In 2012, she became a fellow of the American Mathematical Society.
- In 2013, she became a member of the American Philosophical Society.
- In 2018, she received the Sylvester Medal from the Royal Society.
- In 2019, she became a fellow of the Association for Women in Mathematics.
- For 2025, she was awarded the AMS Leroy P. Steele Prize for Lifetime Achievement.
See also
In Spanish: Dusa McDuff para niños
