Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences
90 episodes listed below
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The Isaac Newton Institute is the world's foremost mathematical research centre. Living Proof aims to highlight the diverse people and interconnected topics linked to its many activities. Interviewees range from visiting academics and lecturers to mathematicians, other scientists, musicians, artists, students, and prominent figures within the University of Cambridge and beyond. The podcast typically involves mathematical themes, but is specifically aimed at a general audience. The focus is on the subjects being interviewed and the social stories they have to tell, not just on the significance and details of the research they may be undertaking. We hope there is interest...
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Living Proof makes the culture around mathematical research as visible as the ideas, from computer-checked proofs to collaboration and public communication.
Living Proof treats mathematical research as a human activity, following how ideas are formalized, communicated and developed through collaboration.
Proof-checking AI, maths pitched to MPs: you hear how researchers try to make themselves understood.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A clear, thoughtful review of quantum diagrams, mathematical notation, and the people drawn to difficult ideas.
Adina Goldberg begins with a grounded idea: information lives in physical systems, while digital information is handled as bits that can be stored, changed, and sent. Quantum theory soon complicates that picture, opening onto possibilities that feel less familiar.
A conjecture for organizing stable homotopy theory gives way to a more complicated landscape.
Ravenel's telescope conjecture arrives as a way to make sense of the stable homotopy groups of spheres. Jeremy Hahn and Tomas Schlenk lay out how maps between spheres can eventually fall into a stable pattern in high dimensions, then turn to what follows from their work…
A measured review of how the Newton Gateway helps mathematical expertise reach wider collaborators.
The Newton Gateway to Mathematics is presented as a practical impact initiative, designed to help mathematical expertise travel beyond the Isaac Newton Institute.
A steady, historically grounded look at a famous proof and the ideas around it.
This episode returns to the seminar room where Andrew Wiles first announced his proof of Fermat's Last Theorem and gives the math room to breathe.
A plainspoken account of how a mathematics workshop became a practical bridge between the INI and Ibadan.
The episode traces how a mathematics workshop on equivariant methods became a working bridge between the INI and the University of Ibadan, and why that mattered beyond the research talk itself.
Digital twin ideas meet the practical work of heart modelling and treatment decisions.
This conversation examines what a digital twin of the heart is and why it matters for clinical decisions. It is presented as a patient-specific computational representation that changes over time, with uses in diagnostics, forecasting, treatment choice, and selecting patients…
A careful look at twistor theory and the language problem that shapes progress across mathematics and physics.
The discussion frames twistor theory as a geometric idea first proposed by Roger Penrose and presented here as a possible bridge between general relativity and quantum mechanics.
A close look at Noether as both a mathematician and a maker of mathematical culture.
This episode treats Emmy Noether less as a lone genius and more as someone moving through institutions, jobs, and teaching arrangements that shaped what she could do.
Odd math, made approachable.
Monthly maths puzzles for practical teachers.
Favorite theorems, no quiz attached.
Everyday objects, carefully turned toward maths.
Spinach, schoolteachers and Fields Medals: mathematics as life story
Two hosts, three problems, and the working shown.
Adina Goldberg, a PhD student at the University of Waterloo, describes how her work in quantum information theory uses operator algebras, category theory, and diagrammatic methods to study bits and qubits.
Dan Aspel welcomes Alex Miatowicz and Kadina Kotar to Living Proof and starts with a light exchange about Kotar’s hats.
This segment introduces Ekaterina Eremenko discussing her documentary on mathematician Olga Ladyzhenskaya, her background in math, and a personal tragedy that influenced her career shift.
Rachel Thomas introduces Celine Brockhardt, who talks about quantum physics and makes the case that a non-specialist can still get the basic ideas.
Dan Aspel talks with Professor Kevin Buzzard about the Maths Library project and the practical question of whether computers can help human mathematicians with proofs.
Dan Aspel talks with Lionel Mason and Maciek Donajski about the Twistor Theory programme.
Sarah Khan, Rachel Thomas, and Marianne Freiberger open by introducing the Living Proof podcast from the Isaac Newton Institute and plus.maths.org.
Jeremy Hahn and Tomas Schlenk tell Living Proof that they disproved part of Ravenel’s telescope conjecture in homotopy theory, with Ishan Levy and Robert Birkeland named as coauthors.
Dan Aspel interviews Claire Merritt, manager of the Newton Gateway to Mathematics, celebrating its 10th anniversary.
Host Dan Aspel interviews Rachel Thomas and Marianne Freiberger from PLUS magazine about the challenges and importance of communicating advanced mathematical research to the public.
Living Proof speaks with Zhou Li about a proof in algebraic topology.
Sarah Hart's Cambridge Festival talk begins with a scale problem.
The episode follows the first workshop in an INI program on new equivariant methods in algebraic and differential geometry.
Dan Aspel speaks with three medalists from the 2024 STEM for Britain awards at the UK Parliament.
Mark Bly and Sasha Korobkin discuss the Isaac Newton Institute satellite programme The Mathematics of Multiphase Flows with Applications.
Host Dan Aspel interviews Luke Davis, an Isaac Newton Institute Postdoctoral Fellow, about his experience with the fellowship and his involvement in the Stochastic Systems for Anomalous Diffusion programme.
This special episode marks exactly thirty years since Andrew Wiles announced his first proof of Fermat's Last Theorem.
Dan Aspel welcomes Simon Cox and Adil Mughal in Aberystwyth.
The episode is a thoughtful conversation about digital twins for the heart.
The episode centers on a staging of *Diving into Maths with Emmy Noether*.