Past LMS President Professor Dame Frances Kirwan FRS has been elected to the Savilian Professorship at the University of Oxford. Professor Kirwan is the first woman to hold the Professorship since it was founded in 1619.
Throughout her notable career Professor Kirwan has made many outstanding contributions in the area of algebraic geometry. During her career she has also received many honours including being elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2001 (only the third female mathematician to attain this honour), and the President of the London Mathematical Society from 2003-2005 (the second female ever elected). Professor Kirwan has for many years been active in addressing the gender imbalance in mathematics, both as a past member of the LMS Women in Mathematics Committee and also in European Women in Mathematics, having served as Convenor, as well as chairing the Prizes Committee of the European Mathematical Society’s 6th European Congress of Mathematicians in 2013, the year she was also awarded an LMS Senior Whitehead Prize.