Events
Alexander Shapiro, Univ. of California, Berkeley, Modular functor from higher Teichmüller theory
Quantized higher Teichmüller theory, as described by Fock and Goncharov, assigns an algebra and its representation to a surface and a Lie group. This assignment is equivariant with respect to the action of the mapping class group of the surface, and is conjectured to give an analog of a modular functor, that is it should respect the operation…
Spring 2020 Beginning of Semester Meeting
SAS 1102Dean McGahan will be attending and will speak at the meeting. I am happy to solicit questions from the faculty and staff that will be sent to the Dean ahead of the meeting so that she can address them. The Dean will be available for about 25 minutes at the start of the meeting. We plan…
Maria-Veronica Ciocanel, Ohio State University, Stochastic and continuum dynamics in cellular transport
The cellular cytoskeleton is essential in proper cell function as well as in organism development. These filaments represent the roads along which most protein transport occurs inside cells. I will discuss examples where questions about filament-motor protein interactions require the development of novel mathematical modeling, analysis, and simulation. In the development of egg cells into…
Corey Jones, Ohio State University, Fusion categories and their applications in mathematical physics
Fusion categories are rich mathematical structures generalizing the representation categories of finite groups. They arise in many areas of mathematics and physics. Most strikingly, they have emerged as models for particle-like excitations with exotic exchange statistics in low dimensional quantum field theories. We will provide an introduction to these ideas and discuss recent results on…
Peter McGrath, Univ. of Pennsylvania, Existence and Uniqueness Results for Minimal Surfaces
A hypersurface in a Riemannian manifold is called minimal if its mean curvature vanishes identically. Minimal surfaces have fascinated mathematicians since the time of Euler, and tremendous progress has been made in understanding the structure of the space of embedded minimal surfaces in various ambient manifolds in the last 50 years. After surveying the subject, I will…
JMM Reception
Denver, ColoradoThe department will host a reception at the JMM in Denver on Friday January 17th, 6:00-8:00 pm, Capitol Ballroom 6, Hyatt. All alumni, friends, and participants in the Department of Mathematics programs at North Carolina State University are invited to attend and meet old friends, and to hear about recent events in the department. Hors…
Charles Puelz, Courant Institute, Computer models and numerical methods for mathematical cardiology
This talk will cover two approaches for modeling blood flow in the human body. The first approach describes blood transport in elastic vessels and requires the numerical solution of a nonlinear hyperbolic system on branching vessel networks. I will discuss some mathematical properties of these equations that seem to be useful for analysis of numerical schemes,…
Teemu Saksala, Rice University, Geometric Inverse Problems arising from Seismology
What can we tell about the interior structure of our planet, if we observe the travel time of a large number of earthquakes? This is the time it takes for a seismic wave to travel from the epicenter of the earthquake to the seismic sensor. In the geometric literature, the boundary rigidity problem on a compact Riemannian manifold…
Math REU Panel
SAS 2102Research Experience for Undergrad (REU) programs are summer jobs where you get paid to research. Panelists will discuss the application process, math research, where to find listings, and more.
Andrew Sageman-Furnas, Technical University of Berlin, Navigating the space of Chebyshev nets
SAS 1102Many materials are built from a grid of flexible but nearly inextensible rods that behaves as a shell-like structure. Everyday examples range from fabrics made of 1000s of interwoven yarns; to kitchen strainers made of 100s of plastically deforming wires; to architectural gridshells or medical stents made of 10s of elastically deforming rods. In this…