Miniconference on Harmonic Analysis and Operator Algebras, Canberra, June 17-20, 1987

In 1987, the Centre for Mathematical Analysis ran a Special Year on Harmonic Analysis and Operator Algebras. Most of the activity involved was concentrated in that period from May to August, and in November and December; during this time the Centre was overrun with people with disparate interests, ranging through classical Harmonic Analysis, Representation Theory, Operator Algebras, Ergodic Theory, Number Theory, Non-commutative Topology, and Mathematical Physics; at the same time, the Centre’s usual program in Partial Differential Equations, Functional Analysis and Numerical Analysis was under way. Space was a problem, but this had its positive aspects too, as persons with different interests, thrown together by fate in the same office, ended up chatting with each other. Apart from informal discussions and regular and spontaneous seminars, two mini-conferences were held in the May to August period, in the (forlorn) hope that all the visitors would get a chance to speak at one or the other of these, if not both. This is the result of the first of these mini-conferences.