The Fall Western Sectional Meeting of the American Mathematical Society originally hosted by UNM, was held (virtually) on October 23-24, 2021. There were 479 participants, a record. Participants represented 32 countries from all continents (except Antartica), 240 different institutions and 43 different states in the US. Of those participants 10.2% were from New Mexico and 12.5% from California, the two largest contingents. UNM had by far the largest number of participants 33, followed by the AMS with 14, UCLA with 13, and Reed College with 12.
The meeting had 23 Special Sessions of which 9 were organized by 15 UNM Math and Stats faculty and 1 alumni. These sessions ranged from Arithmetic Geometry; Commutative Ring Theory; Extremal Polynomials; Geometry and Geometric Analysis, Harmonic Analysis; Mathematics and Modelling of Phylogenetic Networks; Statistical Models and Designs; Theoretical and Applied Perspectives in Machine Learning; and Turbulence, Singularities, and Nonlinear Waves in Fluid Dynamics, Optics, and Plasmas. A number of graduate students, alumni, and faculty were also speakers or coauthors in at least 10 different sessions. There were other sessions organized by colleagues from NMSU, NMTech, LALN, as well as sessions organized by faculty from Western states. Several graduate and undergraduate students attended the conference. Thank you to all the organizers, speakers and participants, well done!
In the last 20 years UNM has organized 5 AMS Western Sectional Meetings (2004, 2007, 2010, 2014, and now in 2021). The meetings in 2004, 2007 and 2014 were held after the New Mexico Analysis Seminar an annual conference that use to alternate between UNM and NMSU. The events in 2007 and 2014 also had special Afternoon in Honor of Mischa Cotlar and in honor of Cora Sadosky respectively, each of these events brought more than 100 people to Albuquerque. The AMS meetings themselves have had between 200-340 registered participants.
Looking forward to Fall 2023 when we are scheduled to host another AMS meeting this time in person (or so we hope).
