The Society for the Foundations of Computational Mathematics supports and promotes fundamental research in computational mathematics and its applications, interpreted in the broadest sense. It fosters interaction among mathematics, computer science and other areas of computational science through its conferences, workshops and publications. As part of this endeavour to promote research across a wide spectrum of subjects concerned with computation, the Society brings together leading researchers working in diverse fields. Major conferences of the Society have been held in Park City (1995), Rio de Janeiro (1997), Oxford (1999), Minneapolis (2002), Santander (2005), and Hong Kong (2008). The next conference is expected to be held in 2011. More information about FoCM is available at its website http://www.focm.net.

The conference in Hong Kong on June 16 – 26, 2008, was attended by several hundred scientists. FoCM conferences follow a set pattern: mornings are devoted to plenary talks, while in the afternoon the conference divides into a number of workshops, each devoted to a different theme within the broad theme of foundations of computational mathematics. This structure allows for a very high standard of presentation, while affording endless opportunities for cross-fertilization and communication across subject boundaries. Workshops at the Hong Kong conference were held in the following nineteen fields:

1. – Approximation theory

2. – Asymptotic analysis

3. – Computational algebraic geometry

4. – Computational dynamics

5. – Computational number theory

6. – Foundations of numerical PDEs

7. – Geometric integration and computational mechanics

8. – Image and signal processing

9. – Information-based complexity

10. […]