Events - 2012

Martino Lupini, York University

“The complexity of the relation of unitary equivalence for automorphisms of separable unital C*-algebras”

A classical result of Glimm from 1961 asserts that the irreducible
representations of a given separable C*-algebra A are classifiable by real
numbers up to unitary equivalence if and only if A is type I. In 2008,
Kerr-Li-Pichot and, independently, Farah proved that when A is not type I,

Robert Young, University of Toronto

“Lipschitz spheres in the Heisenberg groups”

Hanfeng Li, The State University of New York, Buffalo

Entropy and L2-torsion”

Eric Harper, McMaster University

Akbulut corks and non-trivial involutions on instanton Floer homology”

Tom Ramsey, University of Hawaii

“Kronecker Constants”

Reza Seyyedali, Pure Mathematics Department, University of Waterloo

“Balanced metrics on ruled manifolds”

Tyrone Ghaswala, Department of Pure Mathematics University of Waterloo

“Getting a handle on surfaces”

Chung Pang Mok, McMaster University

"Endoscopic classification of automorphic representations on classical groups"

The recent work of Arthur on classification of automorphic
representations on classical groups is a landmark result in the Langlands'
program. In this talk we will try to indicate the nature of the
classification and the tools that are used in the proof.

Refreshments will be served in MC 5046 at 3:30.

Ross Willard, Pure Mathematics Department, University of Waterloo

"Introduction to the seminar"

This is the first, introductory lecture to a learning seminar on discrete
homotopies for binary reflexive digraphs and their application to finite
relational structures. In this lecture I will briefly overview the idea
of homotopy, state Taylor's theorem (that the existence of continuous

Julia Gordon, University of British Columbia

"The strange world of p-adic numbers"

This talk will be about the fields of p-adic numbers -- which, like the
real numbers, are completions of the rationals, but with respect to a
different metric -- the metric that  reflects divisibility by a prime p.
We will see some very strange effects caused by this unusual metric,  do

Matilde Lalin, Université de Montréal

"Mahler measure of some K3-surfaces"

We study the Mahler measure of the three-variable Laurent
polynomial x+1/x+y+1/y+z-k where k is a parameter. The zeros of this
polynomial define (after desingularization) a family K3-surfaces. In
favorable cases, a singular K3-surface is obtained and the Mahler measure
is related to its L-function. This was first studied by Marie-Jose Bertin.