When groups may be built up as graphs of 'simpler' groups, it is often 
of interest to study how good residual finiteness properties of simpler 
groups can imply residual properties of the whole. The essential case of 
this theory is the study of residual properties of finite groups. In 
this talk I will discuss the question of when a graph of finite 
$p$-groups is residually $p$-finite, for $p$ a prime. I describe the 
previous theorems in this area for one-edge and finite graphs of groups, 
and their method of proof. I will then state my recent generalisation of 
these theorems to potentially infinite graphs of groups, together with 
an alternative and more natural method of proof. Finally I will briefly 
describe a usage of these results in the study of accessibility -- 
namely the existence of a finitely generated inaccessible group which is 
residually $p$-finite.

Knot theory investigates the many ways of embedding a circle into the three-dimensional sphere. The study of these embeddings is not only important for understanding three-dimensional manifolds, but is also intimately related to many new and surprising phenomena appearing in dimension four. I will discuss how four-dimensional interpretations of some invariants can help us understand surfaces that bound a given link (embedding of several disjoint circles).

I will discuss the basics of normal surface theory, and how they were used to give an algorithm for deciding whether a given diagram represents the unknot. This version is primarily based on Haken's work, with simplifications from Schubert and Jaco-Oertel.
 

You’re an amateur investigator hired to uncover the mysterious goings on of a dark cult. They call themselves Geometric Group Theorists and they’re under suspicion of pushing humanity’s knowledge too far. You’ve tracked them down to their supposed headquarters. Foolishly, you enter. Your mind writhes as you gaze unwittingly upon the Eldritch horror they’ve summoned… Group Theory! You think fast; donning the foggy glasses of quasi-isometry, you prevent your mind shattering from the unfathomable complexity of The Beast. You spy a weak spot and the phrase `Gromov Hyperbolicity’ flashes across your mind. You peer deeper, further, forever… only to find yourself somewhere rather familiar, strange, but familiar… no, self-similar! You’ve fought with fractals before, this weirdness can be tamed! Your insight is sufficient and The Beast retreats for now.
In other words, given an infinite group, we associate to it an infinite graph, called a Cayley graph, which gives us a notion of the ‘geometry’ of a group. Through this we can ask what kind of groups have hyperbolic geometry, or at least an approximation of it called Gromov hyperbolicity. Hyperbolic groups are quite a nice class of groups but a large one, so we introduce the Gromov boundary of a hyperbolic group and explain how it can be used to distinguish groups in this class.