The C&O department has 36 faculty members and 60 graduate students. We are intensely research oriented and hold a strong international reputation in each of our six major areas:
- Algebraic combinatorics
- Combinatorial optimization
- Continuous optimization
- Cryptography
- Graph theory
- Quantum computing
Read more about the department's research to learn of our contributions to the world of mathematics!
News
Three C&O faculty win Outstanding Performance Awards
The awards are given each year to faculty members across the University of Waterloo who demonstrate excellence in teaching and research.
Sina Kalantarzadeh wins Governor General's Gold Medal
The Governor General’s Gold Medal is one of the highest student honours awarded by the University of Waterloo.
Two C&O faculty win Outstanding Performance Awards
The awards are given each year to faculty members across the University of Waterloo who demonstrate excellence in teaching and research.
Events
Algebraic and Enumerative combinatorics seminar -Jerónimo Valencia-Porras-Type C multiline queues and the open-boundary TASEP
| Speaker: | Jerónimo Valencia-Porras |
| Affiliation: | University of Waterloo |
| Location: | MC 6460 |
Abstract: The totally asymmetric simple exclusion process (TASEP) is a finite Markov chain of particles hopping between adjacent sites on a one-dimensional lattice. The multispecies TASEP is a generalization in which particles have different types. These processes have interesting connections to algebraic combinatorics: the stationary distribution of the TASEP on a circle is connected to Macdonald polynomials at t=0, whereas the stationary distribution of the open-boundary TASEP is connected to Koorwinder polynomials at t=0.
Multiline queues were introduced by Ferrari and Martin (2007) to compute the stationary distribution of the multispecies TASEP on a circle. It has been a long-standing open problem to find a combinatorial formula for the stationary distribution of the multispecies TASEP with open boundaries. Recently, we studied the combinatorics of Ferrari–Martin multiline queues using type A crystals. In this talk, we use crystals of type C to construct an analog of multiline queues and give a combinatorial formula for the stationary distribution of the multispecies open-boundary TASEP for a certain specialization of the boundary parameters. This is joint work with Olya Mandelshtam.
There will be a pre-seminar presenting relevant background at beginning graduate level starting at 1:30pm in MC 5417.
Tutte Colloquium -Oliver Pechenik-Dynamics of Increasing Tableaux
| Speaker: | Oliver Pechenik |
| Affiliation: | University of Waterloo |
| Location: | MC 5501 |
Abstract: Standard tableaux are certain grids of numbers that lead a double life in algebraic combinatorics, with distinct roles in geometry and in representation theory. Extending the geometry to K-theory led to a corresponding extension of the combinatorics to a theory of increasing tableaux. I will discuss a long and ongoing program to explicate the combinatorial dynamics of these tableaux, which seems to be revealing that they also have a mysterious second life in representation theory. Despite the algebraic connections, the core problem is fundamentally combinatorial: to give a sufficiently good bijection between tableaux and a set of planar diagrams.