Past Events

Abstract: Elliptic curves are one of the major objects of study in number theory. Over finite fields, their zeta functions were proven to be rational by F. K. Schmidt in 1931. In 1985, R. Schoof devised an algorithm to compute zeta functions of...

A useful way of producing samples from a given measure ν on a state space Ω is by providing a Markov chain whose stationary measure in ν. In order to be able to sample efficiently, one needs to show that the chain "mixes" quickly in terms of the rate...

Mathematics has developed an increasingly “higher dimensional” point of view of when different things deserve the same name, categorifying the traditional logical notion of equality to isomorphism (from Greek isos “equal” and morphe “form” or “shape”...

Periods are numbers that arise as integrals of rational functions with coefficients in Q over sets that are cut out by polynomial inequalities with coefficients in Q. More conceptually, periods are numbers that arise from the natural isomorphism...

The Game of Cycles, introduced in my book Mathematics for Human Flourishing, is played on a connected planar graph together with its bounded cells, and players take turns marking edges with arrows according to a sink-source rule that gives the game a...

A nodal real algebraic curve in the affine plane is called expressive if its defining polynomial has the smallest number of critical points that is allowed by the topology of the set of real points of the curve. This notion can be viewed as a "global...

The Legendre symbol is one of the most basic, mysterious and extensively studied objects in number theory. It is a multiplicative function that encodes information about whether an integer is a square modulo an odd prime p. The Legendre symbol was...

Mathematics is a jungle: A jubilee of flowering plants and mysterious animals. The mathematician is a naturalist, describing the behaviours of whatever she encounters on her tours. With the advent of computers and modern technologies, the dispatches...

Some of the most remarkable achievements of science are the mind-boggling measurements it has contributed throughout history to our collective understanding of the universe. For example, a simple Google search will reveal that the radius of our...

Discs are among the simplest manifolds, but their groups of diffeomorphisms can be very complicated. I will describe the techniques from geometry topology and dynamics that were used to understand these groups in low dimensions, the relationship of...