The PIs propose to continue with the Prairie Analysis Seminar, an ongoing joint project of the University of Kansas and Kansas State University. The seminar already had three previous successful editions in 2001, 2002, and 2003. The scientific activities taking place at the seminar are extremely stimulating and will certain generate further advances in mathematical research in harmonic analysis and related areas. The next meeting will be held in November 2004 in Lawrence. The main speaker is Stephen Waniger. He will lecture about discrete problems in harmonic analysis. These are problems whose solution require the use of methods from analytic number theory and relate to the study of operators acting on functions defined on the n-dimensional integers or discrete subgroups of homogeneous groups. The other two invited speakers will be Loukas Grafakos who will describe results about maximal multipliers and Akos Magyar who will present some Ramsey type results on lattice points. All the topics are of current interest in harmonic analysis and address important difficult problems in the area.
This annual conference is of extreme importance in the geographical area and it is quickly becoming a tradition with national and even international reputation. The seminar is structured so as to keep costs for the host university and participants to a minimum, allowing a wide range of mathematicians to attend. The main speakers chosen are at the forefront of their field, giving all in attendance the opportunity to learn of their recent work. Equally important is that the conference will allow the participating graduate and postdoctoral students to give contributed talks, thus increasing their visibility and awareness of their work in the mathematical community. This is of crucial relevance in the education of graduate students as well as for those who have recently obtained their Ph.D. The first three editions of the conference attracted a number of researchers from small universities throughout the region, in addition to those attending from major research institutions. A number of participants are faculty from small universities and colleges in the geographical area. Many of these faculty maintain research careers in spite of geographical isolation and welcome the rare opportunity to meet with other mathematicians. Strong connections with these small universities and colleges are mutually beneficial, as these schools produce many excellent undergraduate students that can be attracted to graduate education in mathematics and sciences.
