Graphs and Matroids - Jonathan Leake

Title: Lorentzian polynomials

Abstract: Lorentzian (aka completely log-concave) polynomials were recently developed by Brändén-Huh and Anari-Liu-Oveis Gharan-Vinzant to settle Mason's conjectures on the log-concavity of the number of size-k independent sets of a matroid. In this talk, we will define these polynomials and sketch the proof of these conjectures. Along the way we will also state other results which will demonstrate the very strong connection between matroids and Lorentzian polynomials.