Unit of Assessment 10
Mathematical Sciences

Our submission in Mathematical Sciences encompasses research in the Mathematics and Statistics Research Division. Our research covers pure and applied mathematical and statistical research, enabling new developments in these areas, and their use to progress interdisciplinary challenges in fields such as weather and climate change, biology and health, polymer physics and soft matter.

Our research is organised into three over-arching themes:

• Pure Mathematics: principally pure and applicable analysis and number theory;
• Applied Mathematics: chiefly in specific fields within environmental mathematics, numerical analysis, mathematical physics and mathematical biology; and
• Statistics: predominantly applied statistics, with some probability & stochastic analysis.

The Division leads the Centre for the Mathematics of Planet Earth (CMPE), which integrates research across our three themes. Its aim is to be a catalyst for ideas and initiatives in the intersection between mathematics and statistics, theoretical physics, data science and Earth system science.

Our research is strongly collaborative with staff active in a number of the University’s other institutes and centres, in particular:

• Data Assimilation Research Centre: which conducts research aimed at improving weather and other geophysical forecasts, and brings together expertise in mathematics and statistics, meteorology and Met Office research staff based at Reading.
• The Walker Institute: which focuses on the development of climate-resilient and sustainable livelihoods, in some of the world’s most vulnerable regions.
• Institute for Cardiovascular & Metabolic Research (ICMR): which brings together scientists to understand the development of cardiovascular diseases.
• Hugh Sinclair Unit of Human Nutrition: which seeks to strengthen the evidence base for dietary recommendations for the prevention of chronic diseases.

Staff and doctoral students

We submitted 22 staff (19.4 FTE) to REF2021, including 6 Professors, 8 Associate Professors, 6 Lecturers and 2 Research Fellows, of whom two were Early Career Researchers. Over the assessment period, there were 55 doctoral completions. The Division is home to an average of 45 PhD students at any one time; in 2019/20 they came from 18 countries including the UK.

We are involved in doctoral training programmes and networks which facilitate interdisciplinary interactions and cement and expand our industry and policy partner engagement:

• We co-lead, with Imperial College, the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in the Mathematics of Planet Earth (cohorts started 2014-18).
• We participate in the NERC Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) SCENARIO (Science of the Environment: Natural and Anthropogenic pRocesses, Impacts and Opportunities) (cohorts starting 2014-23).
• We are partners in the CriticalEarth Marie Skłodowska-Curie Innovative Training Network.
• We are part of the MAGIC consortium of 22 UK mathematics departments supplying teaching and assessment of PhD-level mathematics courses across the UK.

Research centres and partnerships

• Centre for the Mathematics of Planet Earth: the CMPE has strong links with weather and climate research centres around the world including the Met Office, ECMWF, and the German Weather Service.
• Met Office: we are members of the Met Office Academic Partnership, which is a formal collaboration of research excellence bringing together the Met Office and institutions who are among the leading UK universities in weather and climate science.
• National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO): members of the department are part of this NERC centre of excellence.
• German Weather Service (DWD): Professor Roland Potthast is head of the Numerical Weather Prediction section at DWD which strengthens our collaboration with researchers there.

Sector recognition

Selected examples of national and international recognition between 2014 and 2020:

• Vice President of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) UKIE (Professor Jennifer Scott, 2015-17)
• Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) (Professor Jennifer Scott, 2021)
• London Mathematical Society Whitehead Prize (Professor Valerio Lucarini, 2018)
• L.F. Richardson Medal of the European Geosciences Union (Professor Valerio Lucarini, 2020)

Examples of the impact our research has had at local, national and global levels.