Robert Bryant (mathematician)

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Robert L. Bryant
Mathematical Sciences Research Institute
Thesis Some Aspects of the Local and Global Theory of Pfaffian Systems  (1979)
Doctoral advisorRobert Brown Gardner
Doctoral studentsJeanne N. Clelland
Websitefds.duke.edu/db/aas/math/bryant
parameterization of Boy's surface which minimizes the Willmore energy[1]

Robert Leamon Bryant (born August 30, 1953, Kipling) is an American mathematician. He works at Duke University and specializes in differential geometry.[2]

Education and career

Bryant grew up in a farming family in

North Caroline State University at Raleigh in 1974 and a PhD at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1979. His thesis was entitled "Some Aspects of the Local and Global Theory of Pfaffian Systems" and was written under the supervision of Robert Gardner.[4]

He worked at Rice University for seven years, as assistant professor (1979–1981), associate professor (1981–1982) and full professor (1982–1986). He then moved to Duke University, where he worked for twenty years as J. M. Kreps Professor.

Between 2007 and 2013 he worked as full professor at

Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI).[5]
In 2013 he returned to Duke University as Phillip Griffiths Professor of Mathematics.

Bryant was awarded in 1982 a Sloan Research Fellowship.[6] In 1986 he was invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Berkeley.[7]

He was elected in 2002 a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,[8] in 2007 a member of the National Academy of Sciences,[9] in 2013 a fellow of the American Mathematical Society[10] and in 2022 a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.[11][12] He is also a member of the Association for Women in Mathematics, the National Association of Mathematicians and the Mathematical Association of America.[13]

He served as the president of the American Mathematical Society for the 2-years term 2015–2016,[14][3] for which he was the first openly gay president.[3][15]

Bryant is on the board of directors of

EDGE, a transition program for women entering graduate studies in the mathematical sciences.[16] He is also a board member of Spectra, an association for LGBT mathematicians that he helped to create.[17][18]

Research

Bryant's research has been influenced by

Finsler geometry and mathematical physics.[19]

In 1987 he proved several properties of surfaces of unit constant

Kähler metrics whose Bochner curvature vanishes.[21]

In 1987 he produced the first examples of

holonomy groups are G2 or Spin(7)); this showed that every group in Marcel Berger's classification can arise as a holonomy group.[22] Later, he also contributed to the classification of exotic holonomy groups of arbitrary (i.e. non-Riemannian) torsion-free affine connections.[23][24]

Together with

Exterior Differential Systems, writing two influential monographs, which have become the standard reference in the topic.[25][26] He also worked on their cohomology[27][28] and applications to PDEs.[29][30]

He is author of more than 60 papers,[31][32] and he has supervised 26 PhD students.[4]

Books

  • A sampler of Riemann-Finsler Geometry, Cambridge University Press 2004 (editor with David Bao,
    S. S. Chern
    , Zhongmin Shen)
  • Exterior Differential Systems, MSRI Publ. 18, Springer Verlag 1991,
    S. S. Chern, H. L. Goldschmidt and Phillip Griffiths
    )
  • Exterior Differential Systems and Euler-Lagrange Partial Differential Equations, Chicago Lectures in Mathematics, University of Chicago Press 2003,
    ISBN 0-226-07793-4 (with Phillip Griffiths and Dan Grossman)[33]
  • Integral Geometry, Contemporary Mathematics 63, AMS 1987 (editor with
    Sigurdur Helgason
    , R. O. Wells)
  • An introduction to Lie groups and symplectic geometry, in Geometry and quantum field theory, IAS/Park City Math. Series 1, American Mathematical Society 1995, pp. 5–181
  • Toward a Geometry of Differential Equations, in: Geometry, Topology & Physics, Conf. Proc. Lecture Notes Geom. Topology, VI, International Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995, pp. 1–76 (with Lucas Hsu and Phillip Griffiths)

Bryant and David Morrison are the editors of vol. 4 of the Selected Works of Phillip Griffiths.

References

  1. ISSN 0273-0979
    .
  2. ^ "Robert Bryant, Phillip Griffiths Professor of Mathematics and Professor of Computer Science and Chair".
  3. ^ a b c d "AMS Presidents: Robert Bryant" (PDF). American Mathematical Society. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  4. ^ a b "Robert Bryant – The Mathematics Genealogy Project". www.mathgenealogy.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  5. ^ "Biography: Robert Bryant". MSRI. 2008. Archived from the original on September 17, 2009.
  6. ^ "Past Fellows | Alfred P. Sloan Foundation". sloan.org. Archived from the original on March 14, 2018. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  7. ^ Robert L. Bryant (1987). "A Survey of Riemannian Metrics with Special Holonomy Groups" (PDF). In Gleason, Andrew (ed.). Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians 1986. Berkley: American Mathematical Society. p. 505.
  8. ^ "Robert L. Bryant". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  9. ^ "Robert L. Bryant". www.nasonline.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  10. ^ List of Fellows of the American Mathematical Society, retrieved 2012-11-10.
  11. ^ "Robert Bryant Named AAAS Fellow". Department of Mathematics. Retrieved January 30, 2022.
  12. ^ "Five Duke Faculty Named AAAS Fellows for 2021". today.duke.edu. Retrieved January 30, 2022.
  13. ^ "Members | Mathematical Association of America". www.maa.org. Retrieved January 30, 2022.
  14. ^ "Bryant Begins Term as AMS President". American Mathematical Society, Homepage. February 3, 2015.
  15. ^ Adriana Salerno (June 28, 2017). "Love simeq love: A celebration of LGBT+ Mathematicians". Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  16. ^ "Board of Directors". EDGE Foundation. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  17. ^ "Spectra". Retrieved September 30, 2019.
  18. ^ Robert Bryant; Ron Buckmire; Lily Khadjavi; Douglas Lind (June–July 2019). "The Origins of Spectra, an Organization for LGBT Mathematicians" (PDF). Notices of the American Mathematical Society. Vol. 66, no. 6. pp. 678–685 – via LGBT Math.
  19. ^ "Robert Bryant – Simons Collaboration on Special Holonomy in Geometry, Analysis, and Physics". Retrieved January 30, 2022.
  20. Zbl 0635.53047
    .
  21. S2CID 119625517
    .
  22. JSTOR 1971360
    .
  23. ISBN 978-0-8218-1492-5
    , retrieved August 8, 2021
  24. arXiv:math/9910059
    .
  25. ISBN 978-1-4613-9716-8
    .
  26. OCLC 51804819
    .
  27. JSTOR 2152923
    .
  28. ISSN 0012-7094
    .
  29. S2CID 195271133
    .
  30. S2CID 15812302
    .
  31. ^ "MR: Bryant, Robert L. - 42675". mathscinet.ams.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  32. ^ "Publications of Robert L. Bryant". www.msri.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
  33. doi:10.1090/s0273-0979-05-01062-1
    .

External links
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