When the linear system in Newton’s method is approximately solved using an iterative method we have an inexact or truncated Newton method. The outer method is Newton’s method and the inner iterations will be the iterative method. The Inexact Newton framework is now close to 30 years old and is widely used and given names like Newton-Arnoldi, Newton-CG depending on the inner iterative method. In this talk we will explore convergence properties when the outer iterative method is Gauss-Newton, the Halley method or an interior point method for linear programming problems.

Einstein metrics are fixed points (up to scaling) of Hamilton's Ricci flow. A natural question to ask is whether a given metric is stable in the sense that the flow returns to the Einstein metric under a small perturbation. I'll give a brief survey of this area focussing on the case when the Einstein constant is positive. An interesting class of metrics where this question is not completely resolved are the compact symmetric spaces. I'll report on some recent progress with Tommy Murphy and James Waldron where we have been able to use a criterion due to Kroencke to show the Kaehler-Einstein metric on some Grassmannians and the bi-invariant metric on the Lie group G_2 are unstable.

Driven by its numerous applications in computational science, the approximation of smooth, high-dimensional functions via sparse polynomial expansions has received significant attention in the last five to ten years.  In the first part of this talk, I will give a brief survey of recent progress in this area.  In particular, I will demonstrate how the proper use of compressed sensing tools leads to new techniques for high-dimensional approximation which can mitigate the curse of dimensionality to a substantial extent.  The rest of the talk is devoted to approximating functions defined on irregular domains.  The vast majority of works on high-dimensional approximation assume the function in question is defined over a tensor-product domain.  Yet this assumption is often unrealistic.  I will introduce a method, known as polynomial frame approximation, suitable for broad classes of irregular domains and present theoretical guarantees for its approximation error, stability, and sample complexity.  These results show the suitability of this approach for high-dimensional approximation through the independence (or weak dependence) of the various guarantees on the ambient dimension d.  Time permitting, I will also discuss several extensions.

Chemical reaction network (CRN) theory focusses on making claims about dynamical behaviours of reaction networks which are, as far as possible, dependent on the network structure but independent of model details such as functions chosen and parameter values. The claims are generally about the existence, nature and stability of limit sets, and the possibility of bifurcations, in models of CRNs with particular structural features. The methodologies developed can often be applied to large classes of models occurring in biology and engineering, including models whose origins are not chemical in nature. Many results have a natural algorithmic formulation. Apart from the potential for application, the results are often pleasing mathematically for their power and generality. 

This talk will concern some recent themes in CRN theory, particularly focussed on how the presence or absence of particular subnetworks ("motifs") influences allowed dynamical behaviours in ODE models of a CRN. A number of recent results take the form: "a CRN containing no subnetworks satisfying condition X cannot display behaviour of type Y"; but also, in the opposite direction, "if a CRN contains a subnetwork satisfying condition X, then some model of this CRN from class C admits behaviour of type Y". The proofs of such results draw on a variety of techniques from analysis, algebra, combinatorics, and convex geometry. I'll describe some of these results, outline their proofs, and sketch some current challenges in this area. 
 

Cracks in many soft solids behave very differently to the classical picture of fracture, where cracks are long and thin, with damage localised to a crack tip. In particular, small cracks in soft solids become highly rounded — almost circular — before they start to extend. However, despite being commonplace, this is still not well understood. We use a phase-separation technique in soft, stretched solids to controllably nucleate and grow small, nascent cracks. These give insight into the soft failure process. In particular, our results suggest fracture occurs in two regimes. When a crack is large, it obeys classical linear-elastic fracture mechanics, but when it is small it grows in a new, scale-free way at a constant driving stress.

Many fluid flows in natural systems are highly complex, with an often beguilingly intricate and confusing detailed structure. Yet, as with many systems, a good deal of insight can be gained by testing the consequences of simple mathematical models that capture the essential physics.  We’ll tour two such problems.  In the summer melt seasons in Greenland, lakes form on the surface of the ice which have been observed to rapidly drain.  The propagation of the meltwater in the subsurface couples the elastic deformation of the ice and, crucially, the flow of water within the deformable subglacial till.  In this case the poroelastic deformation of the till plays a subtle, but crucial, role in routing the surface meltwater which spreads indefinitely, and has implications for how we think about large-scale motion in groundwater aquifers or geological carbon storage.  In contrast, when magma erupts onto the Earth’s surface it flows before rapidly cooling and crystallising.  Using analogies from the kitchen we construct, and experimentally test, a simple model of what sets the ultimate extent of magmatic intrusions on Earth and, as it turns out, on Venus.  The results are delicious!  In both these cases, we see how a simplified mathematical analysis provides insight into large scale phenomena.

This work is devoted to the study of the following boundary value problem for compressible Navier-Stokes equations\begin{align*}&\begin{aligned}[b] \partial_t(\varrho \mathbf{u})+\text{div}(\varrho \mathbf u\otimes\mathbf u) &+\nabla p(\rho)\\&= \text{div} \mathbb S(\mathbf u)+\varrho\, \mathbf f\quad\text{ in }\Omega\times (0,T),\end{aligned} \\[6pt]&\partial_t\varrho+\text{div}(\varrho \mathbf u)=0\quad\text{ in }\Omega\times (0,T), \\[6pt]&\begin{aligned}[c] &\mathbf u=0\quad\text{ on }\partial \Omega\times( 0,T), \\ &\mathbf u(x,0)=\mathbf u_0(x)\quad\text{ in } \Omega,\\&\varrho(x,0)= \varrho_0(x) \quad\text{ in } \Omega, \end{aligned}\end{align*} where $\Omega$ is a bounded domain in $\mathbb R^d$, $d=2,3$, $\varrho_0>0$, $\mathbf u_0$, $\mathbf f$ are given functions, $p(\varrho)=\varrho^\gamma$, $\mathbb S(\mathbf u)=\mu(\nabla\mathbf{u}+\nabla\mathbf{u}^\top)+\lambda \text{div } \mathbf{u}$, $\mu, \lambda$ are positive constants. We consider the endpoint cases $\gamma=3/2$, $d=3$ and $\gamma=1$, $d=2$, when the energy estimate does not guarantee the integrability of the kinetic energy density with an exponent greater than 1, which leads to the so-called concentration problem. In order to cope with this difficulty we develop new approach to the problem. Our method is based on the estimates of the Newton potential of $p(\varrho)$. We prove that the kinetic energy density in 3-dimensional problem with $\gamma=3/2$ is bounded in $L\log L^\alpha$ Orlitz space and obtain new estimates for the pressure function. In the case $d=2$ and $\gamma=1$ we prove the existence of the weak solution to the problem. We also discuss the structure of concentrations for rotationally-symmetric and stationary solutions.