Algebra comutativa si combinatorica "Nicolae Radu"

Prof. Nicolae Radu initiated the Seminar of Commutative Algebra in 1964 at the Faculty of Mathematics and Mechanics (as it was called those days) of the University of Bucharest. Among the participants there were famous Romanian mathematicians: Constantin Bănică, Alexandru Brezuleanu, Alexandru Duma, Martin Jurchescu, Alexandru Lascu, Alexandru Radu, Octavian Stănăşilă, Manuela Stoia. At the beginning there were mainly lectures from the book Éléments de Géométrie Algébrique by A. Grothendieck, lectures that were later incorporated by N. Radu in the book Inele locale, Ed. Academiei, 1968. Some of the former participants left the country over the years, others left the subject, mainly for Complex Analysis. However the seminar kept on going also in harder times. Within this seminar many young mathematicians were introduced to Commutative Algebra and prepared their Ph. D. thesis under the supervision of Prof. Radu and many other people working mainly in neighbouring research areas attended the seminar. As adjacent activities of the seminar, many editions of the National School on Algebra and several conferences in Commutative Algebra were organized. We must mention some of the people that, over the years, attended the seminar: Şerban Bărcănescu, Gabriel Chiriacescu, Mihai Cipu, Adrian Constantinescu, Tiberiu Dumitrescu, Viviana Ene, Cristodor Ionescu, Cristiana Mateescu, Wanda Morariu, Vasile Nica, Dorin Popescu, Radu Ursianu. Some people who were not mainly working in Commutative Algebra, like Şerban Basarab, Nicolae Bonciocat or Florin Nicolae, participated actively in the seminar, in some periods, with interesting lectures. The last decade, other young people joined the seminar: Claudia Andrei-Ciobanu, Mircea Cimpoeaş, Rodica Dinu, Mihai Epure, Bogdan Ichim, Dumitru Stamate, Alin Ştefan, Marius Vlădoiu.

Since 1990, once that the Institute of Mathematics was refounded, the seminar was jointly organized by the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science of the University of Bucharest and Simion Stoilow Institute of Mathematics of the Romanian Academy. The subject of the seminar changed in time to Combinatorics in Commutative Algebra, but there are also lectures in Singularity Theory, Algebraic Geometry and Number Theory. After Prof. Nicolae Radu untimely passed away in 2001, the participants of the seminar unanimously decided to call it the Nicolae Radu Seminar on Commutative Algebra and Combinatorics.