Past

A theory of Sobolev inequalities in arbitrary open sets in $R^n$ is offered. Boundary regularity of domains is replaced with information on boundary traces of trial functions and of their derivatives up to some explicit minimal order. The relevant Sobolev inequalities involve constants independent of the geometry of the domain, and exhibit the same critical exponents as in the classical inequalities on regular domains. Our approach relies upon new representation formulas for Sobolev functions, and on ensuing pointwise estimates which hold in any open set. This is a joint work with V. Maz'ya.

If G is a semi-simple Lie group, it is known that all lattices
are arithmetic unless (up to finite index) G=SO(n,1) or SU(n,1).
Non-arithmetic lattices have been constructed in SO(n,1) for
all n and there are infinitely many non-arithmetic lattices in
SU(1,1). Mostow and Deligne-Mostow constructed 9 commensurability
classes of non-arithmetic lattices in SU(2,1) and a single
example in SU(3,1). The problem is open for n at least 4.
I will survey the history of this problem, and then describe
recent joint work with Martin Deraux and Julien Paupert, where
we construct 10 new commensurability classes of non-arithmetic
lattices in SU(2,1). These are the first examples to be constructed
since the work of Deligne and Mostow in 1986.

The model of random interlacements is a one-parameter family of random subsets of $\Z^d$, which locally describes the trace of a simple random walk on a $d$-dimensional torus running up to time $u$ times its volume. Here, $u$ serves as an intensity parameter.

Its complement, the so-called vacant set, has been show to undergo a non-trivial percolation phase transition in $u$, i.e., there is $u_*(d)\in (0,\infty)$ such that for all $u<u_*(d)$ the vacant set has a unique infinite connected component (supercritical phase), while for $u>u_*(d)$ all connected components are finite.

So far all results regarding geometric properties of this infinite connected component have been proven under the assumption that $u$ is close to zero. 

I will discuss a recent result, which states that throughout most of the supercritical phase simple random walk on the infinite connected component is transient, provided that the dimension is high enough.

This is joint work with Alexander Drewitz

A meromorphic connection on a complex curve can be interpreted as a representation of a simple Lie algebroid.  By integrating this Lie algebroid to a Lie groupoid, one obtains a complex surface on which the parallel transport of the connection is globally well-defined and holomorphic, despite the apparent singularities of the corresponding differential equations.  I will describe these groupoids and explain how they can be used to illuminate various aspects of the classical theory of singular ODEs, such as the resummation of divergent series solutions.  (This talk is based on joint work with Marco Gualtieri and Songhao Li.)

Abstract: L\'evy processes are increasingly popular for modelling stochastic process data with jump behaviour. In practice statisticians only observe discretely sampled increments of the process, leading to a statistical inverse problem. To understand the jump behaviour of the process one needs to make inference on the infinite-dimensional parameter given by the L\'evy measure. We discuss recent developments in the analysis of this problem, including in particular functional limit theorems for commonly used estimators of the generalised distribution function of the L\'evy measure, and their application to statistical uncertainty quantification methodology (confidence bands and tests). 

Based upon our joint work with M. Marcolli, I will introduce some algebraic geometric models in cosmology related to the "boundaries" of space-time: Big Bang, Mixmaster Universe, and Roger Penrose's crossovers between aeons. We suggest to model the kinematics of Big Bang using the algebraic geometric (or analytic) blow up of a point $x$. This creates a boundary  which consists of the projective space of tangent directions to $x$ and possibly of the light cone of $x$. We argue that time on the boundary undergoes the Wick rotation and becomes purely imaginary. The Mixmaster (Bianchi IX) model of the early history of the universe is neatly explained in this picture by postulating that the reverse Wick rotation follows a hyperbolic geodesic connecting imaginary time axis to the real one. Roger Penrose's idea to see the Big Bang as a sign of crossover from "the end of the previous aeon" of the expanding and cooling Universe to the "beginning of the next aeon" is interpreted as an identification of a natural boundary of Minkowski space at infinity with the Bing Bang boundary.

Networks are a convenient way to represent systems of interacting entities. Many networks contain "communities" of nodes that are more densely connected to each other than to nodes in the rest of the network.

Most methods for detecting communities are designed for static networks. However, in many applications, entities and/or interactions between entities evolve in time.

We investigate "multilayer modularity maximization", a method for detecting communities in temporal networks. The main difference between this method and most previous methods for detecting communities in temporal networks is that communities identified in one temporal snapshot are not independent of connectivity patterns in other snapshots.  We show how the resulting partition reflects a trade-off between static community structure within snapshots and persistence of community structure between snapshots. As a focal example in our numerical experiments, we study time-dependent financial asset correlation networks.

The behaviour of complex processing systems is often controlled by large numbers of parameters.  For example, one Thales radar processor has over 2000 adjustable parameters.  Evaluating the performance for each set of parameters is typically time-consuming, involving either simulation or processing of large recorded data sets (or both).  In processing recorded data, the optimum parameters for one data set are unlikely to be optimal for another.

We would be interested in discussing mathematical techniques that could make the process of optimisation more efficient and effective, and what we might learn from a more mathematical approach.

I will explain the basics of deformation quantization of Poisson
algebras (an important tool in mathematical physics). Roughly, it is a
family of associative algebras deforming the original commutative
algebra. Following Fedosov, I will describe a classification of
quantizations of (algebraic) symplectic manifolds.
 

I will describe joint work with Manjul Bhargava (Princeton) and Tom Fisher (Cambridge) in which we determine the probability that random equation from certain families  has a solution either locally (over the reals or the p-adics), everywhere locally,  or globally. Three kinds of equation will be considered: quadratics in any number of variables, ternary cubics and hyperelliptic quartics.

In today's interconnected world, the dissemination of an idea, a trend, a rumor through social networks, as well as the propagation of information or cyber-viruses through digital networks are all common phenomena. They are conceptually similar to the spread of infectious diseases among hosts, as common to all these phenomena is the dissemination of a spreading agent on a networked system. A large body of research has been produced in recent years to characterize the spread of epidemics on static connectivity patterns in a wide range of biological and socio-technical systems. In particular, understanding the mechanisms and conditions for widespread dissemination represents a crucial step for its prevention and control (e.g. in the case of diseases) or for its enhancement (e.g. in the case of viral marketing). This task is however further hindered by the temporal nature characterizing the activation of the connections shaping the networked system, for which data has recently become available. As an example, in networks of proximity contacts among individuals, connections represent sequences of contacts that are active for given periods of time. The time variation of contacts in a networked system may fundamentally alter the properties of spreading processes occurring on it, with respect to static networks, and affect the condition at which epidemics become possible. In this talk I will present a novel theoretical framework adopting a multi-layer perspective for the analytical understanding of the interplay between temporal networks and spreading dynamics. The framework is tested on a set of time-varying network models and empirical networks.

In this talk, we discuss the development of fast iterative solvers for matrix systems arising from various constrained optimization problems. In particular, we seek to exploit the saddle point structure of these problems to construct powerful preconditioners for the resulting systems, using appropriate approximations of the (1,1)-block and Schur complement.

The problems we consider arise from two well-studied subject areas within computational optimization. Specifically, we investigate the
numerical solution of PDE-constrained optimization problems, and the interior point method (IPM) solution of linear/quadratic programming
problems. Indeed a particular focus in this talk is the interior point method solution of PDE-constrained optimization problems with
additional inequality constraints on the state and control variables.

We present a range of optimization problems which we seek to solve using our methodology, and examine the theoretical and practical
convergence properties of our iterative methods for these problems.
 

We investigate the problem of optimizing the shape and

location of actuators or sensors for evolution systems

driven by a partial differential equation, like for

instance a wave equation, a Schrödinger equation, or a

parabolic system, on an arbitrary domain Omega, in

arbitrary dimension, with boundary conditions if there

is a boundary, which can be of Dirichlet, Neumann,

mixed or Robin. This kind of problem is frequently

encountered in applications where one aims, for

instance, at maximizing the quality of reconstruction

of the solution, using only a partial observation. From

the mathematical point of view, using probabilistic

considerations we model this problem as the problem of

maximizing what we call a randomized observability

constant, over all possible subdomains of Omega having

a prescribed measure. The spectral analysis of this

problem reveals intimate connections with the theory of

quantum chaos. More precisely, if the domain Omega

satisfies some quantum ergodic assumptions then we

provide a solution to this problem.



These works are in collaboration with Emmanuel Trélat

(Univ. Paris 6) and Enrique Zuazua (BCAM Bilbao, Spain).

NOTE CHANGE OF TIME AND PLACE

It is known by results of Macintyre and Chatzidakis-Hrushovski that the theory ACFA of existentially closed difference fields is decidable. By developing techniques of difference algebraic geometry, we view quantifier elimination as an instance of a direct image theorem for Galois formulae on difference schemes. In a context where we restrict ourselves to directly presented difference schemes whose definition only involves algebraic correspondences, we develop a coarser yet effective procedure, resulting in a primitive recursive quantifier elimination. We shall discuss various algebraic applications of Galois stratification and connections to fields with Frobenius.

 Voevodsky asked what the topology of the universe is in a 
continuous interpretation of type theory, such as Johnstone's 
topological topos. We can actually give a model-independent answer: it 
is indiscrete. I will briefly introduce "intensional Martin-Loef type 
theory" (MLTT) and formulate and prove this in type theory (as opposed 
to as a meta-theorem about type theory). As an application or corollary, 
I will also deduce an analogue of Rice's Theorem for the universe: the 
universe (the large type of all small types) has no non-trivial 
extensional, decidable properties. Topologically this is the fact that 
it doesn't have any clopens other than the trivial ones.

A group is called residually finite if every non-trivial element can be homomorphically mapped to a finite group such that the image is again non-trivial. Residually finite groups are interesting because quite a lot of information about them can be reconstructed from their finite quotients. Baumslag showed that if G is a finitely generated residually finite group then Aut(G) is also residually finite. Using a similar method Grossman showed that if G is a finitely generated conjugacy separable group with "nice" automorphisms then Out(G) is residually finite. The graph product is a group theoretic construction naturally generalising free and direct products in the category of groups. We show that if G is a finite graph product of finitely generated residually finite groups then Out(G) is residually finite (modulo some technical conditions)

Soluble groups, and other classes of groups that can be built from simpler groups, are useful test cases for studying group properties. I will talk about techniques for building profinite groups from simpler ones, and how  to use these to investigate the cohomology of such groups and recover information about the group structure.

Given a Lagrangian submanifold invariant under a Hamiltonian loop, we partially compute the image of the loop's Seidel element under the closed-open string map into the Hochschild cohomology of the Lagrangian. This piece captures the homology class of the loop's orbits on the Lagrangian and can help to prove that the closed-open map is injective in some examples. As a corollary we prove that $\mathbb{RP}^n$ split-generates the Fukaya category of $\mathbb{CP}^n$ over a field of characteristic 2, and the same for real loci of some other toric  varieties.

Suppose that we have a tile $T$ in say $\mathbb{Z}^2$, meaning a finite subset of $\mathbb{Z}^2$. It may or may not be the case that $T$ tiles $\mathbb{Z}^2$, in the sense that $\mathbb{Z}^2$ can be partitioned into copies of $T$. But is there always some higher dimension $\mathbb{Z}^d$ that can be tiled with copies of $T$? We prove that this is the case: for any tile in $\mathbb{Z}^2$ (or in $\mathbb{Z}^n$, any $n$) there is a $d$ such that $\mathbb{Z}^d$ can be tiled with copies of it. This proves a conjecture of Chalcraft.

The first FFT-based algorithm for numerical homogenization from high-resolution images was proposed by Moulinec and Suquet in 1994 as an alternative to finite elements and twenty years later, it is still widely used in computational micromechanics of materials. The method is based on an iterative solution to an integral equation of the Lippmann-Schwinger type, whose kernel can be explicitly expressed in the Fourier domain. Only recently, it has been recognized that the algorithm has a variational structure arising from a Fourier-Galerkin method. In this talk, I will show how this insight can be used to significantly improve the performance of the original Moulinec-Suquet solver. In particular, I will focus on (i) influence of an iterative solver used to solve the system of linear algebraic equations, (ii) effects of numerical integration of the Galerkin weak form, and (iii) convergence of an a-posteriori bound on the solution during iterations.

A year ago I gave a talk raising questions about Faraday shielding which stimulated discussion with John Ockendon and others and led to a collaboration with Jon Chapman and Dave Hewett.  The problem is one of harmonic functions subject to constant-potential boundary conditions.  A year later, we are happy with the solution we have found, and the paper will appear in SIAM Review.  Though many assume as we originally did that Faraday shielding must be exponentially effective, and Feynman even argues this explicitly in his Lectures, we have found that in fact, the shielding is only linear.  Along the way to explaining this we make use of Mikhlin's numerical method of series expansion, homogenization by multiple scales analysis, conformal mapping, a phase transition, Brownian motion, some ideas recollected from high school about electrostatic induction, and a constrained quadratic optimization problem solvable via a block 2x2 KKT matrix.

We will focus on vortex gradient fields of unit-length. The associated stream function solves the eikonal equation, more precisely it is the distance function to a point. We will prove a kinetic formulation characterizing such vector fields in any dimension.
 

A permutation group is called sharply n-transitive if it acts 

freely and transitively on the set of ordered n-tuples of distinct 

points. The investigation of such permutation groups is a classical 

branch of group theory; it led Emile Mathieu to the discovery of the 

smallest finite simple sporadic groups in the 1860's. In this talk I 

will discuss the case where the permutation group is assumed to be a 

locally compact transformation group, and explain how this set-up is 

related to Gromov hyperbolicity and to arithmetic lattices in products 

of trees.

We consider the problem of minimising the commute or shuttle time for a diffusion between the endpoints of an interval. The control is the scale function for the diffusion. We show that the dynamic version of the problem has the same solution as the static version if we start at an end point and consider the much harder case where the starting point is in the interior.

tba

I shall demonstrate, under some mild assumptions, that the symmetry group of  extreme, Killing, supergravity horzions contains an sl(2, R) subalgebra.  The proof requires a generalization of the  Lichnerowicz theorem for non-metric connections. The techniques developed can also be applied in the classification
of AdS and Minkowski flux backgrounds.
 

Computational models of the heart have been primarily developed to simulate, analyse and understand experimental measurements. Increasingly biophysical models are being used to understand cardiac disease and pathologies in patients. This shift from laboratory to clinical contexts requires the development of new modelling frameworks to simulate pathological states that invalidate assumptions in existing modelling frameworks, work flows to integrate multiple data sets to constrain model parameters and an understanding of the clinical questions that models can answer. We report on the development and application of biophysical modelling frameworks representing the cardiac electrical and mechanical systems, which are currently being customised for modelling cardiac pathologies.

Our study addresses the question of how an arbitrage-free semimartingale model is affected when the knowledge about a random time is added. Precisely, we focus on the No-Unbounded-Profit-with-Bounded-Risk condition, which is also known in the literature as the first kind of no arbitrage. In the general semimartingale setting, we provide a sufficient condition on the random time and price process for which the no arbitrage is preserved under filtration enlargement. Moreover we study the condition on the random time for which the no arbitrage is preserved for any process. This talk is based on a joint work with Tahir Choulli, Jun Deng and Monique Jeanblanc.

We present some recent work - joint with Arno Fehm - in which we give an `existential Ax-Kochen-Ershov principle' for equicharacteristic henselian valued fields. More precisely, we show that the existential theory of such a valued field depends only on the existential theory of the residue field. In residue characteristic zero, this result is well-known and follows from the classical Ax-Kochen-Ershov Theorems. In arbitrary (but equal) characteristic, our proof uses F-V Kuhlmann's theory of tame fields. One corollary is an unconditional proof that the existential theory of F_q((t)) is decidable. We will explain how this relates to the earlier conditional proof of this result, due to Denef and Schoutens.
 

In this talk I shall discuss some classical results on isometric embedding of positively/nonegatively curved surfaces into $\mathbb{R}^3$. 

    The isometric embedding problem has played a crucial role in the development of geometric analysis and nonlinear PDE techniques--Nash invented his Nash-Moser techniques to prove the embeddability of general manifolds; later Gromov recast the problem into his ``h-Principle", which recently led to a major breakthrough by C. De Lellis et al. in the analysis of Euler/Navier-Stokes. Moreover, Nirenberg settled (positively) the Weyl Problem: given a smooth metric with strictly positive Gaussian curvature on a closed surface, does there exist a global isometric embedding into the Euclidean space $\mathbb{R}^3$? This work is proved by the continuity method and based on the regularity theory of the Monge-Ampere Equation, which led to Cheng-Yau's renowned works on the Minkowski Problem and the Calabi Conjecture. 

    Today we shall summarise Nirenberg's original proof for the Weyl problem. Also, we shall describe Hamilton's simplified proof using Nash-Moser Inverse Function Theorem, and Guan-Li's generalisation to the case of nonnegative Gaussian curvature. We shall also mention the status-quo of the related problems.

Thanks to the p-adic local Langlands correspondence for GL_2(Q_p), one "knows" all admissible unitary topologically irreducible representations of GL_2(Z_p). In this talk I will focus on some elementary properties of their restriction to GL_2(Z_p): for instance, to what extent does the restriction to GL_2(Z_p) allow one to recover the original representation, when is the restriction of finite length, etc.

Stability of the hp-Raviart-Thomas projection operator as a mapping H^1(K) -> H^1(K) on the unit cube K in R^3 has been addressed e.g. in [2], see also [1]. These results are suboptimal with respect to the polynomial degree. In this talk we present quasi-optimal stability estimates for the hp-Raviart-Thomas projection operator on the cube. The analysis involves elements of the polynomial approximation theory on an interval and the real method of Banach space interpolation.

(Joint work with Herbert Egger, TU Darmstadt)

[1] Mark Ainsworth and Katia Pinchedez. hp-approximation theory for BDFM and RT finite elements on quadrilaterals. SIAM J. Numer. Anal., 40(6):2047–2068 (electronic) (2003), 2002.

[2] Dominik Schötzau, Christoph Schwab, and Andrea Toselli. Mixed hp-DGFEM for incompressible flows. SIAM J. Numer. Anal., 40(6):2171–2194 (electronic) (2003), 2002.

In the presence of a translation space-like Killing field

the 3 + 1 vacuum Einstein equations reduce to the 2 + 1

Einstein equations with a scalar field. We work in

generalised wave coordinates. In this gauge Einstein

equations can be written as a system of quaslinear

quadratic wave equations. The main difficulty is due to

the weak decay of free solutions to the wave equation in 2

dimensions. To prove long time existence of solutions, we

have to rely on the particular structure of Einstein

equations in wave coordinates. We also have to carefully

choose the behaviour of our metric in the exterior region

to enforce convergence to Minkowski space-time at

time-like infinity.

A Kähler group is a group which is isomorphic to the fundamental group of a compact Kähler manifold. In 2008 Dimca and Suciu proved that the groups which are both Kähler and isomorphic to the fundamental group of a closed 3-manifold are precisely the finite subgroups of $O(4)$ which act freely on $S^3$. In this talk we will explain Kotschick's proof of this result. On the 3-manifold side the main tools that will be used are the first Betti number and Poincare Duality and on the Kähler group side we will make use of the Albanese map and some basic results about Kähler groups. All relevant notions will be explained in the talk.

In this talk we will introduce the (bounded) derived category of coherent sheaves on a smooth projective variety X, and explain how the geometry of X endows this category with a very rigid structure. In particular we will give an overview of a theorem of Orlov which states that any sufficiently ‘nice’ functor between such categories must be Fourier-Mukai.

Suppose we have a finite graph. We can view this as a resistor network where each edge has unit resistance. We can then calculate the resistance between any two vertices and ask questions like `which graph with $n$ vertices and $m$ edges minimises the average resistance between pairs of vertices?' There is a `obvious' solution; we show that this answer is not correct.

This problem was motivated by some questions about the design of statistical experiments (and has some surprising applications in chemistry) but this talk will not assume any statistical knowledge.

This is joint work with Robert Johnson.