The ALAMA network of Linear Algebra, Matrix Analysis and Applications is a network of excellence, which is recognised and funded by the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness, and holds a monographic workshop every two years in the spring on a specific issue within its area of interest. The first three ALAMA workshops were held at ICES in 2011, 2013, 2015. Our intention is to dedicate the 2025 Workshop to pay homage to the figure of Professor Nicholas J. Higham, Royal Society Research Professor and Richardson Professor of Applied Mathematics of the University of Manchester, who passed away in January 2024.
Professor Nicholas J. Higham, president of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) from 2017 to 2018, has always been a researcher of reference for the international communities of Numerical Linear Algebra and Matrix Analysis, not only for his outstanding contributions in the field of research, but also for his untiring dissemination activitiy, shown in his own website. In 1996 he published the monography "Accuracy and Stability for Numerical Algorithms'', an encyclopedic reference, which is still, in its revised version, the definitive primary reference for courses discussing the behavior of numerical algorithms in finite arithmetic (i.e., in the presence of roundoff errors). Other examples of his concern with scientific dissemination are his 1998 "Handbook of Writing for the Mathematical Sciences", his "MATLAB Guide", published in 2000 (this one co-authored with is brother Desmond, one of the invited speakers at the Workshop) or his own website , which, among many other things, one can find the blog entitled 'What is...?' where, since 2020, Prof. Higham published brief, but generally very informative 'posts' about various (in the end, almost one hundred) important concepts in Numerical Linear Algebra Lineal Numerica and other related fields.
Nick Higham's influence on the Spanish Linear Algebra community, gathered around ALAMA, looms large over the years. He was plenary invited speaker at several scientific events organized in Spain, among them the ICIAM 2019 Conference in Valencia or, especially, the last edition of the annual conference of the International Linear Algebra Society (ILAS), held in Madrid in June 2023, which Prof. Higham attended despite the advanced stage of his illness.
Through this event we hope not only to pay a well-deserved tribute to one of the most influential figures around Numerical Linear Algebra in the last 30 years, but also to offer the youngest researchers in the ALAMA network the opportunity to become familiar with some of the most relevant ideas in Higham's research. To do this, we have invited three of his closest collaborators, who, together with other Spanish colleagues, will attempt to present an overview as complete as possible of Nick Higham's legacy.
The Organizing Committee
