L4

In the mean curvature flow, translating solutions are an important model for singularity formation. In this talk, I will describe the asymptotic structure of 2D mean curvature flow translators embedded in R^3 which have finite total curvature, which turns out to be highly rigid. I will outline the proof of this asymptotic description, in particular focusing on some novel and unexpected features of this proof.

A central theme of complex geometry is the relationship between differential-geometric PDEs and algebro-geometric notions of stability. Examples include Hermitian Yang-Mills connections and Kähler-Einstein metrics on the PDE side, and slope stability and K-stability on the algebro-geometric side. I will describe a general framework associating geometric PDEs on complex manifolds to notions of stability, and will sketch a proof showing that existence of solutions is equivalent to stability in a model case. The framework can be seen as an analogue in the setting of varieties of Bridgeland's stability conditions on triangulated categories.

Fix a Calabi-Yau 3-fold X. Its DT invariants count stable bundles and sheaves on X. The generalised DT invariants of Joyce-Song count semistable bundles and sheaves on X. I will describe work with Soheyla Feyzbakhsh showing these generalised DT invariants in any rank r can be written in terms of rank 1 invariants. By the MNOP conjecture the latter are determined by the GW invariants of X.
Along the way we also show they are determined by rank 0 invariants counting sheaves supported on surfaces in X. These invariants are predicted by S-duality to be governed by (vector-valued, mock) modular forms.

Free boundary minimal surfaces are a notoriously elusive object in geometric analysis. From 2011, Fraser and Schoen's research program found a relationship between free boundary minimal surfaces in unit balls and metrics which maximise the first nontrivial Steklov eigenvalue. In this talk, I will explain how we can adapt homogenisation theory, a branch of applied mathematics, to a geometric setting in order to obtain surfaces with first Steklov eigenvalue as large as possible, and how it leads to the existence of free boundary minimal surfaces which were previously thought not to exist.

The past few years have been an exciting time for my work related to rational approximation.  This talk will present four developments:

1. AAA approximation (2016, with Nakatsukasa & Sète)
2. Root-exponential convergence and tapered exponential clustering (2020, with Nakatsukasa & Weideman)
3. Lightning (2017-2020, with Gopal & Brubeck)
4. Log-lightning (2020-21, with Nakatsukasa & Baddoo)

Two other topics will not be discussed:

X. AAA-Lawson approximation (2018, with Nakatsukasa)
Y. AAA-LS approximation (2021, with Costa)

Computing spectral properties of operators is fundamental in the sciences, with applications in quantum mechanics, signal processing, fluid mechanics, dynamical systems, etc. However, the infinite-dimensional problem is infamously difficult (common difficulties include spectral pollution and dealing with continuous spectra). This talk introduces classes of practical resolvent-based algorithms that rigorously compute a zoo of spectral properties of operators on Hilbert spaces. We also discuss how these methods form part of a broader programme on the foundations of computation. The focus will be computing spectra with error control and spectral measures, for general discrete and differential operators. Analogous to eigenvalues and eigenvectors, these objects “diagonalise” operators in infinite dimensions through the spectral theorem. The first is computed by an algorithm that approximates resolvent norms. The second is computed by building convolutions of appropriate rational functions with the measure via the resolvent operator (solving shifted linear systems). The final part of the talk provides purely data-driven algorithms that compute the spectral properties of Koopman operators, with convergence guarantees, from snapshot data. Koopman operators “linearise” nonlinear dynamical systems, the price being a reduction to an infinite-dimensional spectral problem (c.f. “Koopmania”, describing their surge in popularity). The talk will end with applications of these new methods in several thousand state-space dimensions.

The classical Minkowski problem consists in finding a convex polyhedron from data consisting of normals to their faces and their surface areas. In the smooth case, the corresponding problem for convex bodies is to find the convex body given the Gauss curvature of its boundary, as a function of the unit normal. The proof consists of three parts: existence, uniqueness and regularity. 

In this talk, we study a Minkowski problem for certain measure, called p-capacitary surface area measure, associated to a compact convex set $E$ with nonempty interior and its $p-$harmonic capacitary function (solution to the p-Laplace equation in the complement of $E$).  If $\mu_p$ denotes this measure, then the Minkowski problem we consider in this setting is that; for a given finite Borel positive measure $\mu$ on $\mathbb{S}^{n-1}$, find necessary and sufficient conditions for which there exists a convex body $E$ with $\mu_p =\mu$. We will discuss the existence, uniqueness, and regularity of this problem which have deep connections with the Brunn-Minkowski inequality for p-capacity and Monge-Amp{\`e}re equation.

The parabolic Allen-Cahn equations is the gradient flow of phase transition energy and can be viewed as a diffused version of mean curvature flows of hypersurfaces. It has been known by the works of Ilmanen and Tonegawa that the energy densities of the Allen-Cahn flows converges to mean curvature flows in the sense of varifold and the limit varifold is integer rectifiable. It is not known in general whether the transition layers have higher regularity of convergence yet. In this talk, I will report on a joint work with Huy Nguyen that under the low entropy condition, the convergence of transition layers can be upgraded to C^{2,\alpha} sense. This is motivated by the work of Wang-Wei and Chodosh-Mantoulidis in elliptic case that under the condition of stability, one can upgrade the regularity of convergence.

This talk has been cancelled.