The Applied Probability Trust in its 38th Year

The Applied Probability Trust in its 38th Year

The Applied Probability Trust (APT) is a non-profit making foundation created in 1964 to encourage mathematical scholarship and research, more particularly in the field of probability and it applications. It is now nearing the end of its 38th year of existence. The APT currently publishes three journals and a student magazine on a periodic basis, as well as some special books from time to time. The three journals are the Journal of Applied Probability (JAP started in 1964), and Advances in Applied Probability (AAP started in 1969), both dedicated to research in applied probability, and The Mathematical Scientist (TMS started in 1976), a periodical of exposition and research of more general mathematical interest. The student magazine is Mathematical Spectrum (MS started in 1969). The books have been Festschrifts in honour of eminent probabilists such as Lajos Takacs in 1994, and more recently David Vere-Jones in 2001, or books of interest to students such as A Mathematical Spectrum Miscellany in 2000.

The aim of the APT has always been to produce high quality mathematical publications at prices affordable to students and researchers. The four Trustees, who are at present Daryl Daley, Joseph Gani and Chris Heyde of the Australian National University (ANU), and Sir John Kingman (representing the London Mathematical Society, LMS) of the University of Bristol, have been fully aware of this responsibility, and have maintained the prices of all APT publications at a reasonable level over many years. For example, the journal prices in pounds sterling for 2000, 2001 and 2002 will have remained fixed for three years. Perhaps a little historical background will prove helpful at this stage.

In 1963, Gani, who had identified the need for a journal in English devoted to probability and its applications, travelled during his sabbatical year from Canberra to Britain and the USA. He discussed the possibility of such a journal with colleagues, and received a great deal of moral support, as well as promises of editorial help. On his return to the ANU Department of Statistics, he persuaded two of his colleagues (Norma McArthur and Ted Hannan) to help him raise the necessary finance; they personally contributed half the funds required to sustain two annual issues of JAP. He then approached the ANU, the Australian Mathematical Society and the Australian Academy of Science for the remaining half, but was disappointed by all three. David Kendall, with whom he had spoken about the project, then advised him to apply to the Council of the London Mathematical Society for support; they agreed to provide the remaining half of the funds. As a result, the APT was legally founded by Trust deed in 1964, with Gani, McArthur and Hannan as Australian Trustees and Sir Edward Collingwood as the British Trustee representing the LMS. The APT remains to this day an Anglo-Australian enterprise.

Financially, the APT has traded with losses for 8, and surpluses for 28 years of its existence. It is now firmly established, with an office of four staff members in Sheffield, England, where Gani was a professor between 1965 and 1974. The first Executive Editor in charge of the APT office was Mavis Hitchcock, who grew up with the Trust and retired in 1992 after 27 years of service. She has been followed by Linda Nash, who is currently at the reins. There are three other staff members: a Production Editor, a Subscriptions Coordinator and a Secretary, all technically employees of the University of Sheffield, but with their salaries fully paid by the APT.

The past few years have been a time of rapid change, as traditional printing methods have gradually been replaced by electronic ones. Papers are now often submitted in TeX or LaTeX and prepared as camera-ready copy for the printers by the Production Editor. Computers in the office have recently been upgraded, and the Trustees have agreed with the Cornell University Library to make the APT journals available online from the year 2002, through the EUCLID Project. It will be interesting to see how this promising project develops.

Gani retired as Editor of the two main journals JAP and AAP in 1989, when Chris Heyde became their very enterprising Editor-in-Chief. Gani continues as General Managing Editor of the APT journals, and edits TMS, which he enjoys working on. David Sharpe has been Editor of MS for many years, and was responsible for the recent book A Mathematical Spectrum Miscellany. Daryl Daley has just completed editing the Festschrift in honour of David Vere-Jones (Vol.38A of JAP), due out in September 2001. Publishing activities are centered on the APT office, where new problems constantly arise which demand the attention of both staff and Trustees; so far, such problems have been happily resolved.

The future seems difficult to predict: one can hardly imagine that probabilistic models will fall out of favour, though their direction may well alter. A recent innovation by Heyde has been the section on `Stochastic Geometry and Statistical Applications' in AAP, which has proved very popular. Papers on probabilistic models of financial mathematics are also becoming more common. Whatever the future may hold for the APT, the aim of the Trustees will remain unchanged: to provide high quality mathematical publications at affordable prices, thus encouraging scholarship and research in the mathematical community.

J. Gani
School of Mathematical Sciences
Australian National University

The Applied Probability Trust in its 38th Year