MATH+ Board member Andrea Walther of Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin has recently been elected to the Council of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM). She has been an active member of SIAM since 2011. The Council will serve from 01 January 2024 until 31 December 2026. Congratulations!

SIAM, the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, plays a crucial role in connecting the mathematical community with the broader scientific and industrial community. It promotes the practical applications of mathematical methods to solve real-world problems and fosters the development of applied mathematical and computational methodologies needed in various application areas.

In her candidate statement, Andrea Walther elaborates:
“Bridging the gap between mathematical theory and real-world applications forms the core motivation of my mathematical research. To achieve this goal, a vital interaction between mathematics and practitioners is indispensable. SIAM, as the leading international society for applied and industrial mathematics, supports this exchange with a unique infrastructure including high-quality conferences and workshops, top-ranked journals, and influential book series.”

Andrea Walther has been a MATH+ Professor of Mathematical Optimization in the Department of Mathematics at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin since October 2019. Her research interests lie in Nonlinear Optimization, specifically in developing and analyzing adjoint-based optimization methods, new approaches for nonsmooth optimization, and developing optimization methods for machine learning.

She studied Mathematics and Economy at Universität Bayreuth. In 1999, she obtained her PhD, and in 2008 she received her habilitation, both from Technische Universität Dresden. During that time, she held several research positions at TU Dresden, including a Junior Professorship. In 2009, she was appointed Professor of Mathematics and its Applications at Universität Paderborn and held this position until 2019 when she moved to Berlin.

Within MATH+, she became a member of the MATH+ Board in November 2022. As a highly active MATH+ scientist, she co-organized the Thematic Einstein Semester (TES) “Mathematical Optimization for Machine Learning” in the summer semester of 2023 and is currently involved in the following MATH+ research projects:

• AA2-7: Sparse Deep Neuronal Networks for the Design of Solar Energy Materials
  Andrea Walther, Stephan Schmidt, Bernd Rech, Eva Unger

• AA4-14: Data-Driven Prediction of the Band-Gap for Perovskites 
  Claudia Draxl, Sebastian Pokutta, Daniel Walter, Andrea Walther

• AA5-6: Convolutional Proximal Neural Networks for Solving Inverse Problems
  Gabriele Steidl, Andrea Walther

• EF1-23: On a Frank-Wolfe Approach for Abs-Smooth Optimization 
  Sebastian Pokutta, Andrea Walther, Zev Woodstock

LINKS:

• SIAM Announces Newest Leadership
• SIAM website
• More about Andrea Walther at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin