Seminars and Colloquiums
for the week of February 22, 2010
Speaker:
Professor Morwen Thistlethwaite, Monday
Professor Jie Xiong, Monday
Mr. Chad Kilpatrick, Wednesday
Mr. Zachary Smith, Wednesday
Professor Grozdena Todorova, Thursday
Professor Jerzy Dydak, Friday
Professor Murugiah Muraleetharan, University of CA, Riverside, Friday
Monday, February 22
TOPOLOGY SEMINAR
TIME: 11:15 – 12:05
ROOM: Temple 303
SPEAKER: Professor Morwen Thistlethwaite
TITLE: “Detecting symmetries of links"
ABSTRACT: In this talk the symmetry group of a link in the 3-sphere will be the group of self-homeomorphisms of the (3-sphere, link) pair modulo the group of isotopies of the pair. Thus two self-homeomorphisms are considered to be equivalent if one can be deformed continuously to the other through homeomorphisms. We'll discuss which kinds of groups can arise as symmetry groups of links, and also discuss methods for determining these groups. It turns out that the situation for hyperbolic links is quite different from that for non-hyperbolic links.
PROBABILITY SEMINAR
TIME: 11:15 – 12:05
ROOM: HBB 132
SPEAKER: Professor Jie Xiong
TITLE: “Large deviation principle for diffusion processes under a nonlinear expectation”
ABSTRACT: Motivated from the study of mathematical finance, we establish a large deviation principle of the Freidlin and Wentzell type under nonlinear probability for diffusion processes with a small diffusion coefficient. We extend and provide a new proof for a variational identity of Bou\'e and Dupuis which is widely used in deriving the large deviation principle under classical linear probability.
Wednesday, February 24
COURSE GEOMETRY SEMINAR
TIME: 11:15 – 12:05
ROOM: Temple 303
SPEAKER: Mr. Chad Kilpatrick
TITLE: “Property A is Equivalent to Nuclearity and Exactness for Countable
Discrete Groups G” III”
ABSTRACT: In this talk, we will see that for a countable discrete group G, property A is equivalent to:
1. Cr*(G) is exact
2. Cu*(G) is nuclear
3. Cu*(G) is exact.
Here, a C*-algebra A is defined to be nuclear if for any finite subset F of A, the identity map may be approximated on F by unital completely positive maps which factorize through Mn(C), for some n. In this talk, I closely follow Ch. 4: "Connections with C*-Algebras” from
Rufus Willet’s Some Notes on Property A.
ANALYSIS SEMINAR
TIME: 3:35 – 4:30 p.m.
ROOM: HBB 132
SPEAKER: Mr. Zachary Smith
TITLE: “von Neumann type inequalities and a commutant lifting theorem”
ABSTRACT: Commutant lifting theorems are a key idea in understanding the connection between corona problems and interpolation problems. The polydisk and ball are different for dimension greater than 1, and so proofs may take on a different form. We will present a unified proof for a commutant lifting theorem, under the condition that the operators in question satisfy certain von Neumann type inequalities.
Thursday, February 25
JUNIOR COLLOQUIUM
TIME: 3:35 – 4:25 p.m.
ROOM: HBB 102
SPEAKER: Professor Grozdena Todorova
TITLE: “Blow-up vs global existence”
ABSTRACT: We will talk about:
What is a partial differential equation (PDE)?
Where do PDE's come from?
What does it mean to ``solve'' a given PDE?
There is a rich variety of physical phenomena which can be modeled by PDE's. Special attention will be paid to nonlinear Schrodinger equations which are modeling processes in nonlinear optics and laser physics.
We will discuss phenomena related to the so called ``Blow-up'' of solutions, the rate of the blow up, how the blow-up can be arrested, singularity formations and instability.
Pizza will be available at 3:15 in AC 113A.
Friday, February 26
TOPOLOGY SEMINAR
TIME: 11:15 – 12:05
ROOM: Temple 303
SPEAKER: Professor Jerzy Dydak
TITLE: “Introduction to CAT(0) spaces III”
COLLOQUIUM
TIME: 3:35 – 4:25 p.m.
ROOM: HBB 102
SPEAKER: Professor Murugiah Muraleetharan, University of CA, Riverside
TITLE: “Singularity formation of embedded curves evolving on surfaces by curvature flow”
ABSTRACT: New proofs of Grayson’s theorem for curvature flow of embedded curves in planes have been given by Hamilton and Huisken. We extend their techniques to the surface case and give two different proofs for curvature flow of embedded curves in Riemannian surface.
If you are interested in giving or arranging a talk for one of our seminars or colloquiums, please review our calendar.
If you have questions, or a date you would like to confirm, please contact Dr. Steve Wise.
Week of:
Past notices:
Seminars from 2008-2009 academic year
Seminars from 2007-2008 academic year
Seminars from 2006-2007 academic year