Supporting the Conference Series: CBMS Regional Research Conferences in the Mathematical Sciences

NSF/CBMS系列区域数学研究会议是由美国数学科学会议委员会（Conference Board of The Mathematical Sciences， CBMS）管理的一个持续合作项目，在过去的41年里得到了NSF的持续支持。CBMS促进、管理并为该系列提供支持服务。每次会议都有一位杰出的讲师，他就一个重要的当前研究主题，在一个高度集中的数学科学领域，发表一系列的十次讲座。每次会议的当地组织者邀请该领域的其他知名研究人员和感兴趣的新人（包括研究生和博士后研究员）参加会议。讲师承诺根据他或她的讲座准备大量的说明性专著。截至2009年，共举办了320次会议，出版了198部系列专著。这些会议的目的是促进最近取得重大新成果并有望继续取得重大发展的数学科学领域的研究。会议通过让主讲人（他是会议领域的主要研究人员和优秀的说明者）在五天的时间里向与会者发表10次演讲来达到这一目的。讲座通常涵盖该领域的最新发展，并绘制可能的新方向和开放的问题。因此，会议的形式主要是教育性的，但在研究层面。这些会议的参与者中大约有一半是研究生和博士后，会议使他们对数学重要领域的当前研究和有趣的开放问题都有很好的看法。由此产生的专著达到了更广泛的受众，并为希望开始在该领域研究的读者提供了一个介绍。此外，这些会议通常在尚未跻身顶级研究机构之列的机构举行，但这些机构有兴趣加强其在当地的研究活动。今后三年每年将举办最多六到七次会议。

The NSF/CBMS series of Regional Research Conferences in Mathematics is an ongoing cooperative project administered by the Conference Board of the Mathematical Sciences (CBMS) and supported continuously by NSF for the past 41 years. CBMS promotes, administers, and provides support services for the series. Each conference features a distinguished lecturer who delivers a sequence of ten lectures on a topic of important current research in one sharply focused area of the mathematical sciences. The local organizer of each conference invites other established researchers in the field and interested newcomers, including graduate students and post doctoral fellows, to participate in the conference. The lecturer promises to prepare a substantial expository monograph based upon his or her lectures. Through 2009, a total of 320 such conferences have been held and 198 monographs have been published in the series. The purpose of these conferences is to promote research in areas of the mathematical sciences which have recently seen significant new results and which hold promise for continued significant development. A conference achieves that purpose by having the principal lecturer, who is both a major researcher in the area of the conference and a good expositor, deliver 10 lectures over a five day period to the participants. The lectures typically cover the recent development of the field and chart the possible new directions and open problems. Thus the format of the conferences is primarily educational, but at the research level. Approximately one-half of the participants at these conferences are graduate students and postdocs and the conferences give them a good perspective on both the current research and the interesting open problems in an important area of mathematics. The resulting monograph reaches a broader audience and provides an introduction to readers who wish to begin research in the field. Moreover, the conferences are typically held at institutions that are not yet among the top research institutions, but which are interested in enhancing their local research activity. Up to six or seven conferences will be offered in each of the next three years.