Colloquiums

The Centre for Computational Mathematics holds monthly colloquiums where leading researchers highlight the latest advances in the field of Computational Mathematics. Please feel free to browse the list of current and archived colloquiums.

Current Colloquiums

Fall 2024

Spring 2024

Winter 2024

Archived Colloquiums

2023

2022

2021

Winter 2021

Fall 2021

2020

Winter 2020

  • January 13: Ricardo Fukasawa, Solving the vehicle routing problem
  • February 11: Henry Lam, Efficient uncertainty quantification in simulation analysis
  • February 27: Bartosz Protas, Searching for singularities in navier-stokes flows using variational optimization methods

Fall 2020

  • October 1: Eldad Haber, A Computational Mathematics view of deep learning with applications
  • October 29: Vijay Ganesh, Machine learning and logic solvers: the next frontier
  • November 19: Tobias Achterberg, Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) solving in practice
  • December 12: Kimon Fountoulakis, Advanced diffusion methods on large graphs

2019

Winter 2019

  • February 25: Tim Merlis, High-resolution climate simulations to understand how global warming affects hurricanes
  • March 21: Leland McInnes, Unsupervised learning

Fall 2019

  • September 4: Anita Layton, Mathematical models and their applications in diabetes, hypertension and autism
  • October 28: Lin Wang, Evolutionary computation and evolving reverse engineering-based scientific modeling
  • November 7: Andrew Sutherland, Sum of three cubes

2018

Winter 2018

  • April 2: Larry Smith, Computational Mathematics and its billion dollar problems

Fall 2018

  • October 25: Learning and geometry for stochastic dynamical systems in high dimensions
  • November 22: Cody Hyndman, Arbitrage-free regularization, geometric learning, and non-Euclidean filtering in finance

2017

Winter 2017

  • January 20: David Duvenaud, Composing graphical models with neural networks for structured representations and fast inference
  • February 8: Yaoliang Yu, Fast gradient algorithms for structured sparsity
  • March 9: Mauro Maggioni, Geometric methods for the approximation of high-dimensional dynamical systems
  • March 22: David Correa, Material informed computational design in architecture

Spring 2017

  • June 15: Bruno Salvy, Explicit continued fractions for riccati-type equations
  • June 28: Jingbo Wang, Efficient decomposition of quantum walk operators

Fall 2017

  • October 19: David Richter, Droplets and dust in atmospheric turbulence: insight from numerical simulations
  • November 9: Yang Cao, Hybrid stochastic modeling of the budding yeast cell cycle control mechanism
  • November 30: Rober Melko, Machine learning the many-body problem
  • December 8: Shawn Wang, Linear convergence of gradient descent methods in the framework of Bregman distance
  • December 12: Chee Yap, On soft geometric computation

2016

Winter 2016

  • January 11: Chen Greif, The (numerical) linear algebra behind solving problems with constraints
  • January 14: Evelyne Hubert, A moment matrix approach to computing symmetric cubatures
  • February 25: Elissa Ross, Geometric challenges in digital design
  • March 3: Christiane Jablonowski, High-order Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) and variable- resolution techniques for atmospheric weather and climate models
  • March 11: Mark Schmidt, Minimizing finite sums with the stochastic average gradient

Spring 2016

  • May 11: Dick Peltier, Ocean turbulence and global climate variability in the ice-age
  • May 16: Yuri Matiyasevich, Computer experiments for approximating Riemann's zeta function by Dirichlet series
  • June 1: Michael Mossinghoff, FIFA foe fun!

Fall 2016

  • November 17: Neil J. A. Sloane, What comes next after 2, 4, 6, 3, 9, 12, 8, 10? Confessions of a sequence addict
  • December 1: Michael Littman, Reinforcement learning from users: new algorithms and frameworks

2015

Winter 2015

  • January 12: Marius Hofert, Parallel and other simulations in R made easy: an end-to-end study
  • March 18: Csaba Szepesvari, Exploiting symmetries to construct efficient MCMC algorithms with an application to SLAM
  • March 26: Anthony Peirce, Modeling multi-scale processes in hydraulic fracture propagation using the Implicit Level Set Algorithm (ILSA)
  • April 7: Graham Taylor, Deep learning and its challenges for technical computing

Fall 2015

  • September 10: Joachim von zur gathen, Polynomial equations usually describe nice varieties
  • October 1: Warren Hare, Proximal thresholds of PLQ functions
  • October 29: Jacques Carette, Beyond graphic- more mathematics of building video games
  • November 27: Bruce Pitman, Where are you going to go when the volcano blows?
  • December 4: Varvara Roubtsova, SiGran: A 3D virtual laboratory for mechanics of granular media

2014

Winter 2014

  • March 11: Kilian Weinberg, Learning with marginalized corruption
  • April 3: Ian M. Mitchell, The monotone acceptance ordered upwind method (a casual algorithm for minimum time/ cost optimal control) and some lessons in (Ir) reproducible research in computational math
  • April 9: Manuel Kauers, Learning with marginalized corruption

Fall 2014

  • September 22: Éva Tardos, Games, learning and the price of anarchy
  • October 10: Erich Kaltofen, Cleaning-up data with errors: when symbolic-numeric sparse interpolation meets error-correcting codes
  • November 17: Petros Drineas, Randomized Algorithms in Numerical Linear Algebra (RandNLA)

2013

Spring 2013

  • May 31: Joachim von zur Gathen, Generating safe primes and safe moduli
  • May 31: Shaoshi Chen, On the integrability and summability of bivariate rational functions
  • July 19: Sung Ha Kang, Variational and RKHS approach for image colorization and segmentation

Fall 2013

  • September 20: Ruslan Salakhutdinov, Annealing between distributions by averaging moments
  • October 2: Bernardo Cockburn, The HDG methods for partial differential equations
  • November 4: Kees Vuik, Fast robust iterative solvers for the Helmholtz equation
  • December 16: Eric Schost, Building fields

2012

Winter 2012

  • January 30: Christopher Batty, Animating liquids for visual effects: splashing sheets, viscous coiling and rigid body interaction
  • March 6: G. Bard Ermentrout, Flicker hallucinations: faraday waves in the brain
  • April 23: John Burns, Computational methods for design and optimization of PDE systems

Spring 2012

  • June 22: Bernhard von Stengel, Constructing and computing equilibria for two- player games

Fall 2012

  • September 17: Vincent Conitzer, Computing game- theoretic solutions for security
  • October 19: Fei Sha, Domain adaptation for learning in a changing environment
  • October 29: Tim Roughgarden, Porting the computer science toolbox to game theory and economics
  • December 12: Fabrice Deluzet, Asymptomatic preserving methods for anisotropic elliptic problems and applications to simulation of plasma under large magnetic fields

2011

Winter 2011

  • January 17: Chris Eliasmith, How to build a brain: from single neurons to cognition
  • March 30: Jon Kleinberg, Network formation in the presence of contagious risk
  • April 11: Michael Shelley, Novel phenomena and models of active fluids

Spring 2011

  • July 28: Inderjit Dhillon, Fast and memory-efficient low rank approximation of massive graphs

Fall 2011

  • September 26: Annie Chu, Comparison of ETAS parameter estimates across different global tectonic zones
  • October 24: Uri Ascher, Adaptive and stochastic algorithms for piecewise constant EIT and DC resistivity problems with many measurements
  • November 1: Kevin Leyton-Brown, Computational mechanism analysis: towards a "CPLEX" for mechanisms
  • November 22: Michael Braun, Generalized direct sampling for hierarchical bayesian models
  • December 16: David Parkes, Mechanism design through monotone branch-and-bound search

2010

Winter 2010

  • January 25: Paul McNicholas, Recent work in model-based clustering & classification
  • February 22: Marcus Garvie, A three-level semi-discrete in time finite element approximation of a model for skin patterning
  • March 15: Warren Hare, The derivative of a set: normal cones and optimization

Spring 2010

  • May 13: Andrea Lodi, Quadratic {-1,01} optimization
  • May 17: Andreas Buja, Seeing is believing: statistical visualization for teaching data analysis
  • July 26: Jon Wilkening, Computation of time-periodic solutions of fluid interface problems
  • August 5: Marianne Francois, A balanced-force volume tracking algorithm for modeling interfacial flows with mass transfer

Fall 2010

  • September 20: Mark Braverman, Computability and complexity of julia sets
  • October 5: Dustin Lang, Automatic recognition and modeling of astronomical images
  • October 7: Peter Forsyth, Bankers, bonuses and busts
  • November 1: Vahab Mirrokni, Online stochastic ad serving: theory and practice
  • November 22: Richard Peng, Solving symmetric diagonally dominant linear systems

2009

Spring 2009

  • June 4: Aleksandar Jemcov, Algorithm stabilization and acceleration in computational fluid dynamics: exploiting recursive properties of fixed-point algorithms

Fall 2009

  • September 22: Christian Jacob, The swarming body- exploring the possibilities of algorithmic systems in biology
  • December 9: Friedrich Eisenbrand, Constrained minkowski sums: a geometric framework for solving interval problems in computational biology efficiency

2007

Winter 2007

  • January 22: Shirley Mills, Data mining research on networks
  • January 22: William Stein, SAGE: software for algebra and geometry experimentation
  • January 25: Gary Brock, The Ontario Centres of Excellence's new program portfolio: an overview/ question and answer session
  • February 5: Bill Hager, Recent advances in bound constrained optimization
  • February 19: Tamas Terlaky, Central path & edge path: curvature & diameter
  • March 5: Nikos Chrisochoides, Real-time non-rigid registration for IGNS: mesh generation
  • March 19: William Cook, A computational study of the travelling salesman problem

Spring 2007

  • June 4: Aleksandar Jemcov, Algorithm stabilization and acceleration in computational fluid dynamics: exploiting recursive properties of fixed-point algorithms

2006

Winter 2006

  • January 17: Emre Mengi, Measures for robust stability and controllability
  • January 23: Ilias S. Kotsireas, Algorithms in combinatorial design theory
  • January 30: Jonathan Borwein, Plausible reasoning in the 21st century (or what is high performance mathematics?)
  • February 27: Yuying Li, A computational optimization approach for managing financial risk in insurance
  • March 2: Bartosz Protas, On two problems in flow control
  • March 13: Richard Cleve, Efficient quantum algorithms for simulating sparse hamiltonians
  • March 16: Ali Ghodsi, Improving embeddings by flexible exploitation of side information
  • March 27: Fred Hickernell, Solving high dimensional numerical problems
  • April 3: Fadil Santosa, A mathematical problem arising in design of ophthalmic lenses
  • April 18: Majib Mohamadian, Simulation of shallow flows over variable topographies using unstructured grids

Spring 2006

  • May 8: Dan Carr, Maps, hypothesis generations, sliders, visual analytics, and shareware called CCmaps
  • May 9: Manuel Torrilhon, Stabilized explicit runge-kutta methods for solving hyperbolic-parabolic equations

Fall 2006

  • October 6: Fabrice Deluzet, Three dimensional simulations of ionospheric plasma instability
  • October 23: D. Sivakumar, Rank aggregation
  • November 6: Stephen A. Vavasis, Robust solution of hyperelastic solids with large boundary deformation
  • November 20: Christiane Lemieux, Quasi-Monte Carlo: an alternative computational tool to Monte Carlo
  • November 30: Ben Houston, Level set methods, surface representation and scooby-doo

2005

Winter 2005

  • January 13: Jonathan Taylor, Empirical FDR analysis for functional neuroimaging
  • January 17: Thomas F. Coleman, Automatic differentiation and structure (or, practical problems require semi-automatic differentiation)
  • January 24: Kartik Krishnan, A conic interior point dantzig-wolfe decomposition approach for large scale semidefinite programming
  • January 26: Jean-Charles Faugere, Solving Gröbner Bases of Polynomial Systems and an Application in Cryptography
  • January 27: Fabrice Rouillier, Real roots of polynomial systems via Gröbner bases with an application to robotics
  • January 31: Marek Stastna, Three years among the acronyms: a computational mathematics look at climate modelling
  • February 7: Michael Rubinstein, Elliptic curves and random matrix theory
  • February 8: Kevin Hare, Three problems in computational number theory
  • February 14: Henry Wolkowicz, A stable iterative method for linear programming
  • February 21: Matthias Takouda, Semidefinite programming relaxations for the facility layout design
  • March 7: Clinton Groth, A parallel Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) computational framework for physically complex flows
  • March 14: Ali Ghodsi, High-dimensional data analysis by action-respecting embedding
  • March 21: Jonathan Barzilai, Problems with von Neumann's theory: a new theory of measurement
  • April 6: Greg Lewis, Numerical computation of bifurcations in a model of differentially heated rotating fluid system
  • April 11: Ashwin Nayak, Simulating protein folding pathway and the need of distributed computation
  • April 18: Jeff Chen, Simulating protein folding pathway and the need of distributed computation

Spring 2005

  • May 4: Kees Oosterlee, Evaluation of European and American options with grid stretching and accurate discretization
  • May 16: Werner Stuetzle, Unsupervised learning: estimating the cluster tree of a density
  • August 15: Rob Knight, Modular patterns in random sequences with applications to RNA structure

Fall 2005

  • September 8: Hongmei Zhu, A new image transform with medical applications
  • September 9: Robert Bixby, Mixed-integer programming---it works out of the box
  • October 5: Fue-Sang Lien, Development of a high-fidelity numerical model for hazard prediction in the urban environment
  • October 17: Stefano Leonardi, Computational tools and experiments for the webgraph
  • October 21: Dianne P. O'Leary, HOPE a homotopy optimization method for protein structure prediction
  • October 24: Ron Kimmel, Generalized Nash equilibrium problems and newton methods
  • October 31: Veronica Piccialli, Generalized Nash equilibrium problems and newton methods
  • November 14: Chris Myers, Systems biology of cellular regulation and signaling: multiscale and multidisciplinary approaches to network structure and function
  • November 16: Sara Mattia, Mixed-integer programming to solve power grid blackout problems
  • November 21: Andrew Odlyzko, Zeros of the riemann zeta function: computations and implications
  • November 28: Gordan Stuhne, A conservative discretization for hydrodynamics on the sphere: simulating global ocean dynamics on unstructured grids
  • December 12: Michael Trick, Scheduling major league baseball

2004

Winter 2004

  • April 16: Martin J. Gander, Domain decomposition methods with convergence rates faster than multigrid

Spring 2004

  • June 17: John M. Chambers, Modern programming with the S language