Preface, Proceedings of the Second Galway Topology Colloquium at Oxford

Topology Atlas Document # ppad-29 | Production Editor: E. Pearl

Proceedings of the Second Galway Topology Colloquium
September, 1998
Oxford, U.K.

Introduction

Following on from last years very successful 1st Galway Topology Colloquium, it was the turn of the Analytic Topology Research Group at the University of Oxford to roll out the welcome mat this September for the participants of the 2nd Galway Topology Colloquium. Aimed at bringing together like-minded researchers from all over the UK, Ireland and North Western Europe, the Colloquium also attracted a band of itinerant New Zealanders and the main invited speaker, Jerry Vaughan from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.

The emphasis of the Colloquium has continued to be on `mutually assisted learning', in which each group and each individual contributed what they could towards better understanding of all our diverse interests. To this end there was a graduate workshop on `Strong Separation Axioms' by the Oxford group, Special Sessions on `Low Separation Topology' (organised by the Belfast group) and `Topology of Manifolds' (organised by the Auckland group), and an excellent series of lectures by Jerry Vaughan on `Reflection Theorems'. Special thanks also to Dona Strauss for her most interesting invited lecture on `The Stone Cech Compactoification of Topological Semigroups', and to Mike Smith, a group theorist from Birmingham, for his talk on `The Topology of Profinite Groups'.

The Colloquium was deemed a success, and it is alleged that the next Galway Proceedings will take place next Summer at The Queen's University, Belfast. Anyone who might wish to attend the 3rd Galway Colloquium are invited to contact Declan McCartan (d.mccartan@qub.ac.uk) or Brian McMaster (t.b.m.mcmaster@qub.ac.uk).

Thanks

Thanks are due to the other organisers. Peter Collins (Oxford), particularly for wresting money from the Mathematical Institute to financially support the Colloquium. Chris Good (Birmingham), for handling money matters, entertainment and an evidently well and personally researched (!) guide to Oxford restaurant life. And most especially, Steven Fisher (Oxford) who did much of the day-to-day organising.

- Paul Gartside (NUI, Galway and Oxford).