Seminars and Colloquiums
for the week of January 21, 2008
Speakers:
Professor Chuck Collins, Junior Colloquium, Tuesday --CANCELLED
Professor Ken Stephenson, Wednesday
Mr. Jay Wilkins, Wednesday
Professor Fernando Schwartz, Friday
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
JUNIOR COLLOQUIUM -- CANCELLED
TIME: 3:40 p.m.
ROOM: Ayres 214
SPEAKER: Professor Chuck Collins
TITLE: "Mathematics and the Bendy Straw"
ABSTRACT: The Bendy Straw: everyone has seen it, played with it and used it,
but did you know that it is a great tool for understanding some deep mathematics
and science? We'll explore the bendy straw and how it relates to measures, generalized
functions, optimization and modern material science. (Bendy straws will be provided)
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
ORAL SPECIALTY EXAMINATION
TIME: 4:00 p.m.
ROOM: Ayres 214
SPEAKER: Mr. Jay Wilkins
COMMITTEE: Professors Plaut (chair), Conant and Freire
ANALYSIS SEMINAR
TIME: 3:35 p.m.
ROOM: Ayres 209A
SPEAKER: Professor Ken Stephenson
TITLE: "Emergent conformal structure and an extension of Thurston's Conjecture"
ABSTRACT: We discuss a new conjecture generalizing that of Thurston on the approximation
of conformal maps via circle packing. In particular, we formulate the notion
of a "discrete conformal structure" and give evidence indicating that
classical conformal structure is an emergent quantity --- that it arises naturally
as the a.s. limit of discrete conformal structures for random triangulations.
Friday, January 25, 2008
DIFFERENTIAL GEOMETRY
TIME: 3:40 -- 4:25 p.m.
ROOM: Ayres 214
SPEAKER: Professor Fernando Schwartz
TITLE: "On the topology of black holes"
ABSTRACT: 3+1 dimensional black holes have spherical topology, but in higher
dimensions this is no longer true. In this talk I will explain the preceding
statement and show a construction, in terms of Riemannian geometry, of outermost
apparent horizons with nonspherical topology.
Previous Announcements:
Week of:
Seminars from 2006-2007 academic year