Radha Kessar facts for kids
Radha Kessar is a talented mathematician from India. She is famous for her work in a special area of math called representation theory of finite groups. This field helps us understand how certain groups of numbers or objects behave. She holds an important position called the Fielden Chair in Pure Mathematics at the University of Manchester in the UK. In 2009, she won the Berwick Prize from the London Mathematical Society, which is a big award for mathematicians.
Her Journey in Math
Radha Kessar started her higher education at Panjab University in India, graduating in 1991. She then moved to the United States to continue her studies. In 1995, she earned her Ph.D. (a very advanced degree) from Ohio State University. Her special research project was about "Blocks And Source Algebras For The Double Covers Of The Symmetric Groups." Her professor, Ronald Solomon, helped guide her work.
After finishing her Ph.D., Radha Kessar worked at several different universities. She was a visiting professor at Yale University and the University of Minnesota. She also worked as a research fellow at University College, Oxford in the UK. In 2002, she went back to Ohio State as a professor. Later, she moved to the University of Aberdeen in 2005, then to City, University of London in 2012. Finally, in 2022, she joined the University of Manchester, where she is now.
Books She Has Written
Radha Kessar has also helped write important math books. With two other mathematicians, Michael Aschbacher and Bob Oliver, she co-authored a book called Fusion Systems in Algebra and Topology. It was published in 2011 by Cambridge University Press.
Awards and Special Recognition
In 2009, Radha Kessar received the Berwick Prize. She shared this award with Joseph Chuang, who later became her colleague. They won the prize for their research paper titled "Symmetric Groups, Wreath Products, Morita Equivalences and Broué's Abelian Defect Conjecture." This paper showed important new ideas in their field of math. She was also named an MSRI Simons Professor for the academic year 2017-2018 at the MSRI, which is a very respected honor in the math world.
