Gerard Murphy (mathematician)

Research

Gerard's research was in functional analysis. In recent times his research was on quantum groups and non-commutative geometry, subjects of importance both for mathematics and physics. He authored more than 70 original mathematical papers, singly or with colleagues in Ireland, Europe and North America. He will also be remembered for his book, C*-algebras and Operator Theory, which was published in 1990 to worldwide acclaim.

Gerard's principal interests were in the general theory of C*-algebras, the spectral and index theory of Toeplitz operators on Hardy spaces of ordered groups and bounded symmetric domains, and the C*-algebra approach to quantum groups.

Groups

Royal Irish Academy: He was a member of the Publications Committee of the Royal Irish Academy and Editor-in-Chief of the Mathematical Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. This is a journal devoted to current research in all areas of pure mathematics and appears twice yearly.

European Union Research Network: He was the Irish coordinator of the European Union Operator Algebras Network. This comprises a group of universities across seven countries in Europe that co-operate to promote research in operator algebras and noncommutative geometry.

Quotes

"Gerard Murphy, like Pythagoras and Boole before him, discovered new mathematical truths, truths that will last forever. Generations of future students and researchers will build on and develop these results." Associate Professor Des MacHale, University College Cork

"Throughout his life, he took his teaching responsibility seriously, and designed his courses to further the student's understanding and appreciation of Mathematics, not only as a tool for understanding other disciplines, but also as one of mankind's greatest scientific and cultural achievements, with a history stretching back to antiquity. He strove to preserve academic standards, constantly resisting the modern tendency to lower them, and always sought to inculcate the notions of precision and proof handed down by the ancient Greeks." Professor Finbarr Holland, University College Cork

Biography

Gerard was born to parents May and Larry Murphy in Drimnagh, Dublin. He came from a large family of 3 boys and 5 girls: John, Derek, Rita, Linda, Joan, Carol and Lauren. Gerard left school at 14 and worked in a variety of menial jobs, but all the while continued to educate himself at home with quiet determination.

Gerard worked his way into Trinity College Dublin on the strength of his performance on a correspondence course. In 1970 he was admitted to Trinity College and read for a degree in Pure Mathematics. His brilliant undergraduate career in Trinity College meant that he was awarded a Foundation Scholarship to support his studies. In 1974 he graduated with a First Class Honours BA, and he won the Berkeley Gold Medal. His success at Trinity marked him out as something special and he was soon after awarded the Gulbenkian Scholarship to enable him to study for a PhD in Cambridge University. He acquired this in 1977 and won the Knight Prize for the quality of his research.

He returned to Trinity College in 1977 and took up a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship, funded by the Department of Education and he commenced his career as a University Lecturer. He then spent four years in North America in Dalhousie University, University of New Hampshire and University of Oregon. He was appointed as a Lecturer in University College Cork where he remained for the rest of his life. He was promoted twice in the minimum time period, to Associate Professor, in recognition of the quality and quantity of his research, the calibre of his teaching and overall contributions to the management of the college.

On foot of his expertise he was invited in the mid 1990s to participate in the EU Operator Algebras Network, and as a result of his involvement he succeeded in attracting substantial funding from the EU which enabled him to organise the first of a series of major conferences on Operators Algebras in UCC in 1995, which attracted mathematicians from all parts of the world, and to fund several postdoctoral research assistants to work under his direction. His membership of this network allowed him to establish an internationally recognised centre of excellence in UCC in operator algebras and non-commutative geometry, a legacy that will endure.

He was promoted to head of the Mathematics Department, University College Cork, when Professor P.D. Barry retired in 1999. He spent 5 years in this position. Gerard was proud of his membership of the Royal Irish Academy and as Joint Editor-in-Chief of its Mathematical Proceedings, which he helped to modernise and produce in electronic form; he raised its profile as an international journal and expanded its readership.

In 2005 he was diagnosed with cancer of the colon and liver. He died peacefully at 57 and is survived by his wife Mary, one son and three daughters, his mother and siblings.

Publications

C*-Algebras and Operator Theory

This book has become a standard textbook in many countries, and is often cited as a reference in research articles. The book was published in 1990 by Academic Press. Its aim is to give an introduction to one of the most dynamic areas of modern mathematics. It is directed at first and second year graduate students intending to specialise in research in operator algebras and at interested researchers from other areas, especially quantum physicists.

He attempted to give an accessible exposition of the core material and to cover a number of topics that have a high contemporary profile. No attempt is made to be encyclopaedic but there are notes at the end of each chapter giving additional results not covered in the text. Each chapter also contains a list of problems for the reader to test his or her understanding of the material.

The reader is assumed to have a good background in undergraduate real and complex analysis, point set topology and elementary general functional analysis (Hahn–Banach theorem, uniform boundedness principle, Riesz-Kakutani theorem etc.). However, the theory of locally convex spaces is not pre-supposed and the requisite material is developed in a short appendix.

In Spring, 1997 a Russian translation of the book appeared. The translation was supervised by Prof. A. Ya. Helemskii of Moscow State University who has also written the preface.

The bibliographic details for ordering the book from its Moscow publisher are as follows:

DJ. Merfi, C*-Algebri i Teoria Operatorov, Izdatelistvo "Factorial", Moskva, 1997.

Papers

The following is a list of most of Gerard's papers published since 1991.

Note: Gerard has many publications before 1991.