# Seminars & Events for 2009-2010

February 12, 2010
3:00pm - 5:00pm
##### Optimal conditions for the extension of the mean curvature flow
###### Differential Geometry & Geometric Analysis Seminar

In this talk, we will discuss several optimal (global) conditions for the existence of a smooth solution to the mean curvature flow. Our focus will be on quantities involving only the mean curvature. We will also discuss several applications of a local curvature estimate which is a parabolic analogue of Choi-Schoen estimate for minimal submanifolds. This is joint work with Natasa Sesum.

Speaker: Nam Le, Columbia University
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 15, 2010
4:00pm - 6:00pm
##### A Database Schema for the Global Dynamics of Multiparameter Nonlinear Systems
###### PACM/Applied Mathematics Colloquium

Prof. Mischaikow will discuss new computational tools based on topological methods that extracts coarse, but rigorous, combinatorial descriptions of global dynamics of multiparameter nonlinear systems. This techniques are motivated by several observations which we claim can, at least in part, be addressed:

Speaker: Konstantin Mischaikow, Mathematics and BioMaPS Institute, Rutgers University
Location:
Fine Hall 214
February 15, 2010
4:00pm - 6:00pm
##### Quantized Poincarè maps in chaotic scattering
###### Analysis Seminar

I will sketch a recent approach to study the resonance spectrum of scattering Schrödinger operators, in cases where the trapped set of the corresponding classical dynamics (near some positive energy) is a fractal chaotic repeller. In that situation, we are interested in the distribution of resonances in the vicinity of the real axis, in the semiclassical limit.

Speaker: Stephane Nonnenmacher, IAS
Location:
Fine Hall 110
February 18, 2010
2:00pm - 4:00pm
##### Nodal sets for eigenfunctions of the Laplacian and lattice points on circles and spheres
###### Ergodic Theory & Statistical Mechanics
Speaker: Zeev Rudnick, Tel-Aviv University, IAS
Location:
Fine Hall 401
February 18, 2010
2:15pm - 4:15pm
##### Friedgut's theorem for the continuous cube
###### Discrete Mathematics Seminar

A celebrated theorem of Friedgut says that every boolean function on the discrete cube can be approximated by a function which depends only on a number of variables that depends on the sum of the influences of the variables of f. Dinur and Friedgut conjectured an analogue of this theorem for the continuous cube.

Speaker: Hamed Hatami, Princeton University
Location:
Fine Hall 224
February 18, 2010
2:30pm - 4:30pm
##### Motivic invariants of the rational numbers
###### Algebraic Topology Seminar

We report on joint work in progress with Kyle Orsmby. Via local-to-global techniques and Adams spectral sequence computations we access motivic invariants such as K-theory, cobordism and stable stems of the rational numbers.

Speaker: Paul Arne Oestver, University of Oslo
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 18, 2010
4:30pm - 6:30pm
##### Real quadratic analogues of values of the j-function at CM points
###### Princeton University/IAS Number Theory Seminar

An interesting new class of modular forms has emerged in the last several years that generalize Ramanujan's mock theta functions. The generalization is based on an observation of of Zwegers who showed that mock theta functions occur as holomorphic parts of harmonic Maass forms of weight 1/2 having singularities in cusps.

Speaker: William Duke, UCLA
Location:
IAS Room S-101
February 19, 2010
3:00pm - 5:00pm
##### Complete Calabi-Yau metrics from rational elliptic surfaces
###### Differential Geometry & Geometric Analysis Seminar

A rational elliptic surface is the blow-up of P2 in the nine base points of a pencil of cubics. The pencil then lifts as a fibration of the surface by elliptic curves. I show that the complement of any fiber F admits families of complete Calabi-Yau metrics, whose asymptotic geometry depends in a delicate way on the monodromy of the fibration around F.

Speaker: Hans-Joachim Hein, Princeton University
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 19, 2010
4:00pm - 6:00pm
##### Superconcentration
###### Mathematical Physics Seminar

We introduce the term 'superconcentration' to describe the phenomenon when a function of a Gaussian random field exhibits a far stronger concentration than predicted by classical concentration of measure. We show that when superconcentration happens, the field becomes chaotic under small perturbations and a 'multiple valley picture' emerges. Conversely, chaos implies superconcentration.

Speaker: Sourav Chatterjee, University of California - Berkeley, Courant Institute
Location:
IAS Room S-101
February 22, 2010
4:00pm - 6:00pm
##### Detection of Faint Edges in Noisy Images
###### PACM/Applied Mathematics Colloquium

One of the most intensively studied problems in image processing concerns how to detect edges in images. Edges are important since they mark the locations of discontinuities in depth, surface orientation, or reflectance, and their detection can facilitate a variety of applications including image segmentation and object recognition.

Speaker: Ronen Basri, Weizmann Institute of Science
Location:
Fine Hall 214
February 23, 2010
12:30pm - 1:30pm
##### Infinite Ergodic Theory and Continued Fractions

I will compare (classical) Ergodic Theory and Infinite Ergodic Theory, i.e. when the space has infinite measure. In particular I will describe how to modify the Birkhoff Ergodic Theorem in the infinite setting. As examples, I will discuss the (classical) Euclidean continued fractions and the (less classical) continued fractions with even partial quotients.

Speaker: Francesco Cellarosi,
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 24, 2010
4:30pm - 6:30pm
##### Pretentiousness in the analytic theory of numbers
###### Department Colloquium

Following the brilliant insight of Riemann, that a good understanding of the distribution of prime numbers is equivalent to a good understanding of the location of zeros of pertinent L-functions, analytic number theory has traditionally centered on developing this point-of-view.

Speaker: Andrew Granville, Universite de Montreal
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 25, 2010
2:00pm - 4:00pm
##### Limit theorems for sticky particle systems and positivity of integrated random walks
###### Ergodic Theory & Statistical Mechanics

Consider the model of a one-dimensional gas, whose particles have random initial positions and random initial velocities. Particle attract each other due to gravitation, and stick together at collisions. As time goes, the number of particles decreases while their sizes increase until there forms a giant single particle of the total mass.

Speaker: Vlad Vysotsky, University of Delaware
Location:
Fine Hall 401
February 25, 2010
2:30pm - 4:30pm
##### Pointed torsors and Galois groups
###### Algebraic Topology Seminar

Suppose that $H$ is an algebraic group which is defined over a field $k$, and let $L$ be the algebraic closure of $k$. The canonical stalk for the etale topology on $k$ induces a simplicial set map from the classifying space $B(H-tors)$ of the groupoid of $H$-torsors (aka. principal $H$-bundles) to the space $BH(L)$. The homotopy fibres of this map are groupoids of pointed torsors.

Speaker: Rick Jardine, University of Western Ontario
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 25, 2010
4:30pm - 6:30pm
##### Heegaard Floer Homology and Knot Surgeries
###### Topology Seminar

Wallace and Lickorish showed that any 3-manifold can be realized as surgery on a link in S3; however, fifty years later, we still have a rather poor understanding of which manifolds can be constructed from surgery on a knot and which knots give these surgeries. For example, the Berge Conjecture attempts to list all knots which can give rise to a lens space.

Speaker: Margaret Doig, Princeton University
Location:
Fine Hall 314
February 25, 2010
4:30pm - 6:30pm
##### On Eisenstein series and the cohomology of arithmetic groups
###### Princeton University/IAS Number Theory Seminar

The automorphic cohomology of a reductive $\mathbb{Q}$--group $G$, defined in terms of the automorphic spectrum of $G$, captures essential analytic aspects of the arithmetic subgroups of $G$ and their cohomology.

Speaker: Joachim Schwermer, University of Vienna, The Erwin Schrödinger International Institute for Mathematical Physics
Location:
IAS Room S-101
February 26, 2010
3:00pm - 5:00pm
##### Conformally Warped Manifolds and quasi-Einstein metrics
###### Differential Geometry & Geometric Analysis Seminar

The concept of a smooth metric measure space has recently arisen as a useful object within Riemannian geometry, for example in Perelman's formulation of Ricci flow as a gradient flow. In this setting, a key objective is to find a suitable generalization of Ricci curvature, and to understand the associated quasi-Einstein'' metrics.

Speaker: Jeffrey Case, University of California, Santa Barbara
Location:
Fine Hall 314
March 1, 2010
4:00pm - 6:00pm
##### Probabilistic approach to high order assignment problems
###### Department Colloquium

A variety of computer vision and engineering problems can be cast as high order matching problems, where one considers the affinity of two or more assignments simultaneously. The spectral matching approach of Leordeanu and Hebert (2005) was shown to provide an approximate solution of this np-hard problem.

Speaker: Yosi Keller, Bar-Ilan University (Israel)
Location:
Fine Hall 314
March 2, 2010
4:30pm - 6:30pm
##### On the Boltzmann limit of a homogeneous Fermi gas
###### Mathematical Physics Seminar
Speaker: Igor Rodnianski, Princeton University
Location: