The College is delighted to welcome Professor Marco Wan and Professor John King as Visiting Professors for Michaelmas Term 2022.

Professor John King joins Corpus from the School of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Nottingham. He is a visiting scholar at the Isaac Newton Institute at the University of Cambridge.

His research while in Cambridge is centred on applied mathematics and has long-term implications for the understanding of real-world phenomena. The application of singular-perturbation methods to mathematical models exploits the presence of parameters whose small size quantifies the apparent unimportance of the associated processes, but which can – and at first sight paradoxically – play a crucial role in system behaviour. Particularly subtle examples arise in the fast-developing field of beyond-all-orders asymptotics, whereby the relevant terms are exceptionally ('exponentially') small and divergent series play a fascinating role; moreover, such effects are prevalent in important applications in biology, mechanics and physics, ranging from the propagation of biological signals to the formation of fingering patterns in fluid flows. Significant fundamental mathematical developments are required to establish methods that are reliable, flexible and practicable enough to address the full scope of the challenges that arise in such applications.

Professor Marco Wan joins the College from the Faculty of Law at the University of Hong Kong. He is a visiting scholar at the Centre for Film and Screen in the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages at the University of Cambridge.

While in Cambridge he will undertake interdisciplinary research examining how film engages with human rights. Anchoring the project in sexual minority rights, and taking his home jurisdiction of Hong Kong as an example, he will investigate the ways in which filmmakers, lawyers and activists make use of film to further the rights of marginalised communities, and explore the limitations and problems of representation inherent in using the medium for rights advocacy. He will also place the Hong Kong film texts in a global context by putting them in conversation with the work of French, American and East Asian queer filmmakers.

More information on the College’s Visiting Fellowship and Visiting Professorship schemes