Invitations to the lecture and celebration are sent to people
typically including team members and their families and volunteers who
have been involved in training and selection during the year, and
schools entering BMO1 are invited to send groups of pupils subject to
available space.
No. | Date | Lecturer | Title |
1st | 1978 | R F Churchouse | |
2nd | 1979 | Professor David G
Kendall | |
3rd | 1980 | Professor Roger Penrose | |
4th | 1981 | Dr R W Hiorns | Mathematics
and the Future of Man |
5th | 30 September 1982 | Professor T J
Willmore | An extract from the Lady’s and
Gentleman’s diary |
6th | 22 September 1983 | Dr John H
Conway | String and Mathematics |
7th | 27 September 1984 | Professor C
Ambrose Rogers | Geometry: weird and wonderful |
8th | 19 September 1985 | Professor
Fred Piper | Codes & Ciphers – how to keep
secrets |
9th | 25 September 1986 | Dr Keith
Devlin | Factoring Fermat Numbers |
10th | 29 September 1987 | Dr Robin J
Wilson | The four-colour theorem |
11th | 14 September 1988 | Dr Clive
Kilminster | Euler’s constant; with thoughts on censorship
and an open question |
12th | 27 September 1989 | Professor
Christopher Zeeman | Curves of constant diameter |
13th | 25 September 1990 | Dr Ian
Stewart | Four Encounters with Siepinski’s
Gasket |
14th | 17 September 1991 | Dr Roger
Webster | The Tail of π |
15th | 15 September 1992 | Dr Peter
Neumann | Did Galois deserve to be shot? |
16th | 30 September 1993 | Professor
Frank Leppington | Some problems and paradoxes in
mathematics |
17th | 29 September 1994 | Professor David
Williams | Randomness: The only source of order |
18th | 27 September 1995 | Dr Colin
Wright | Juggling – Theory and Practice |
19th | 16 September 1996 | Professor J
Chris Robson | Sound as a Bell |
20th | 15 September 1997 | Dr Tony
Gardiner | The Nature of Mathematical Ability |
21st | 21 September 1998 | Dr John
Rigby | Okumura’s Double Tiling |
22nd | 27 September 1999 | Dr Tom
Körner | Why are we not all called Smith? |
23rd | 18 September 2000 | Professor
Chris Budd | Why does nature care about rational numbers? |
24th | 24 September 2001 | Dr John
Silvester | Geometry ancient and modern |
25th | 23 September 2002 | Dr David
Acheson | Mathematics, Magic and the Electric Guitar |
26th | 29 September 2003 | Professor Adrian
Smith | Why Detectives and Judges need to understand
probability |
27th | 20 September 2004 | Professor Tim
Gowers | How to specify very very large integers |
28th | 19 September 2005 | Professor Frances
Kirwan | Topology, Geometry and Strings |
29th | 25 September 2006 | Professor Sir
Christopher Zeeman | Gyroscopes and Boomerangs |
30th | 1 October 2007 | Professor Marcus du
Sautoy | The Music of the Primes |
31st | 7 October 2008 | Professor David
Spiegelhalter | How long do we have to wait? |
32nd | 21 September 2009 | Professor James
Davenport | The Mathematics behind the Internet |
33rd | 20 September 2010 | Professor Imre
Leader | Clueless Voting |
34th | 26 September 2011 | Professor
József Pelikán | The early years of the
International Mathematical Olympiad |
35th | 1 October 2012 | Professor Ben
Green | Prime Numbers |
36th | 30 September 2013 | Professor Kevin
Buzzard | Solving equations using geometry |
37th | 25 September 2014 | Professor Bernard
Silverman | Mathematics and Science in the Home
Office |
38th | 21 September 2015 | Professor Adam
McBride | Mathematical Challenges |
39th | 26 September 2016 | Dr Zuming
Feng | From classroom to contest
(slides, short
version of slides available) |
40th | 25 September 2017 | Dr Vicky
Neale | Closing the Gap
(video
available) |
41st | 24 September 2018 | Professor Ursula
Martin | Ada Lovelace 1815–1852: mathematician and
computer pioneer
(video
available) |
42nd | 23 September 2019 | Dr Jeremy
King | The Romanian Polygon Game
(video
available) |
No event in 2020 because of COVID-19 pandemic |
43rd | 13 September 2021 | Professor
Imre Leader | Pursuit and Evasion
(video
available) |
44th | 26 September 2022 | Professor Sir
David Spiegelhalter | Trying to explain the maths of the
pandemic
(video
available) |
45th | 25 September 2023 | Professor
Joan Lasenby | An Algebra of Geometric Objects…and
how to use it in Maths, Physics and Engineering |