mathematics

Jonathan Keating

Jonathan Keating is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Jonathan Keating rather than just read about it. In short: Jonathan Peter Keating (born 20 September 1963) is a British mathematician. As of September 2019, he is the Sedleian Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Oxford, and from 2012 to 2019 was the Henry Overton Wills Professor of Mathematics at the University of Bristol, where he served as Dean of the Faculty of Science (2009–2013).

Key takeaways

Jonathan Keating belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Jonathan Keating to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Jonathan Keating from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Jonathan Peter Keating (born 20 September 1963) is a British mathematician. As of September 2019, he is the Sedleian Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Oxford, and from 2012 to 2019 was the Henry Overton Wills Professor of Mathematics at the University of Bristol, where he served as Dean of the Faculty of Science (2009–2013). He has made contributions to applied mathematics and mathematical physics, in particular to quantum chaos, random matrix theory and number theory.

Education He read for an MA in physics at New College, Oxford, before obtaining his PhD in 1989 at the University of Bristol supervised by Michael Berry.

Research and career

He lectured in applied mathematics at the University of Manchester from 1991 to 1995 before moving to the University of Bristol, as a reader in applied mathematics (1995–1997) and then as a professor in mathematical physics (1997–2012). He served as head of the Mathematics department (2001–2004) and was appointed to the Henry Overton Wills Chair in Mathematics at Bristol in 2012. His research has focused on quantum chaos, random matrix theory and its connection to number theory, especially the theory of the Riemann zeta-function and other L-functions. He is known for his work on the resummation of semiclassical periodic orbit formulae, the statistics of quantum energy levels, quantum maps, quantum graphs, the statistics of the zeros of the Riemann zeta-function and other L-functions, and the moments of the Riemann zeta-function and other L-functions. He has served on the editorial boards of several peer reviewed scientific journals including:

Member (1996–2004) of the editorial board of Journal of Physics A. Member (1997–2004) of the editorial board of Nonlinearity. Joint Editor-in-Chief (2004–2012) of Nonlinearity. Member (2003–2017) of the editorial board of Applied Mathematics Research Express. Member (2007–present) of the editorial board of Journal of Mathematical Physics. He was the Chair of the Heilbronn Institute for Mathematical Research until July 2020. In September 2019, he succeeded John M. Ball as Sedleian Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Oxford. In November 2019 he succeeded Caroline Series as president of the London Mathematical Society. His doctoral students include Nina Snaith.

Awards and honours Between 2004 and 2009 Keating was supported by an EPSRC Senior Research Fellowship. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2009. In 2010, he was awarded the London Mathematical Society's Fröhlich Prize. In 2014, he was awarded a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award. He holds an ERC Advanced Grant.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Jonathan Keating

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Jonathan Keating claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Jonathan Keating before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Jonathan Keating ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Jonathan Keating

In research: Jonathan Keating appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Jonathan Keating in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Jonathan Keating is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1963 births, 21st-century English mathematicians, Academics of the University of Manchester, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Jonathan Keating outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Jonathan Keating in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Jonathan Keating means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Jonathan Keating out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Jonathan Keating in simple terms?

Why does Jonathan Keating matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Jonathan Keating?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Jonathan Keating.