Cathleen S. Morawetz Receives 2006 Birkhoff Prize

January 13, 2006

Providence, RI:

Cathleen S. Morawetz of the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, is receiving the 2006 AMS-SIAM George David Birkhoff Prize in Applied Mathematics. Presented every three years jointly by the American Mathematical Society and the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, the Birkhoff Prize recognizes outstanding contributions to applied mathematics in the highest and broadest sense. The prize is being awarded today at the Joint Mathematics Meetings in San Antonio, Texas.

Professor Morawetz is being honored "for her deep and influential work in partial differential equations, most notably in the study of shock waves, transonic flow, scattering theory, and conformally invariant estimates for the wave equation."

Cathleen Morawetz is one of the outstanding applied mathematicians of her generation. Born in Toronto in 1923, she earned her doctorate in 1950 from New York University. She is one of only two women to have served as president of the American Mathematical Society. Her honors include the U.S. National Medal of Science (1998).

Find out more about AMS prizes at http://www.ams.org/prizes-awards.

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Founded in 1888 to further mathematical research and scholarship, the 30,000-member American Mathematical Society fulfills its mission through programs and services that promote mathematical research and its uses, strengthen mathematical education, and foster awareness and appreciation of mathematics and its connections to other disciplines and to everyday life.