I am a Professor of Pure Mathematics in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Bath. This page is here to give some basic information and to direct visitors, most of whom are me, to more useful pages:
Mathematicians' personal web pages are expected to have a picture of them in an interesting foreign city. This one is in St Petersburg. It was taken at a time when visiting St Petersburg was a reasonable and practical thing to do.
My email address is gksankaran@gmail.com and I don't care who knows it. For Bath University official and internal matters, use G.K.Sankaran@bath.ac.uk instead.
Other ways to contact me, in order of decreasing usefulness:
My mathematical interests are mainly in algebraic geometry.
It is impossible to have interests entirely in algebraic geometry, because algebraic geometry is too big. In my case, some of what I do could be described as number theory, and a few bits could be described as topology, algebra, complex analysis or even (this always surprises me) computer science.
My mathematics research page carries a list of my papers. It also tells you about my research students, past and present.
I teach one or two courses a year, depending on how big they are. They are usually algebra, number theory or geometry. Teaching is fun, but unfortunately it is associated with other things, such as exams, which are no fun for anybody. Exams are the worst way of finding out how a student has progressed, except for all those other ways that have been tried from time to time.
My teaching page carries a list of my teaching, with links to some possibly still useful web pages.
I do various other things that are difficult to classify but are related to my job.
In 2018 I was elected to the University of Bath Senate, which is the ultimate academic authority of the university. I lost my seat in the election in 2021, by the narrowest possible margin. I have still not made up my mind whether I was disappointed or relieved, but I have not been a candidate since.
I am a local Bath organiser of the COW seminar but I ceased to be the main organiser in 2018. I am still one of the owners of the mailing list, though, so if you want to join it you can do that by emailing me.
The UK Algebraic Geometry Network was started in 2023 to provide UK-wide network activities in algebraic geometry, building on the experience of COW and GLEN. It is funded by a Network Support for the Mathematical Sciences grant from the Isaac Newton Institute, via EPSRC grant EP/V521929/1,and is coordinated by six people, one of whom is me.
In 2020, Bath hosted LMS Prospects in Mathematics: online in the end, of course. I was one of the organisers.
In 2023, Bath hosted the British Mathematical Colloquium. I was one of the organisers.
I was a co-I on the EPSRC-administered, GCRF-funded project EP/T001968/1 entitled Capacity building in Africa via technology-driven research in algebraic and arithmetic geometry. The planned activities involved travel to and from Africa in 2020 and 2021, so they were wiped out, but this is one part of the wider Abram Gannibal Project, which aims to assist the development of high-level mathematics in Africa. The actual development must, of course, be done by Africans.
In May 2025 we will run a meeting funded by the ICMS programme Mathematics for Humanity with the title Algebra and Geometry from Africa.
I am on a few advisory committees:
The Bath University Venturers Cricket Club is a University team open to all staff and graduate students of the University of Bath, and therefore belongs on this professional page. I play for it, and I organise the fixtures.
My personal page is strictly unofficial and explains a bit more about who I am and what I am interested in.