• Categorical Symmetry of the Standard Model from Gravitational Anomaly 

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Member Seminar Speaker: Juven Wang Title: Categorical Symmetry of the Standard Model from Gravitational Anomaly Abstract: In the Standard Model, the total "sterile right-handed" neutrino number n_{νR} is not equal to the family number Nf. The anomaly index (-Nf+n_{νR}) had been advocated to play an important role in our previous work on Cobordism and Deformation Class of […]

  • Conformal symmetry, Optimization algorithms and the Critical Phenomena

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Speaker: Ning Su, University of Pisa Title: Conformal symmetry, Optimization algorithms and the Critical Phenomena Abstract: In the phase diagram of many substances, the critical points have emergent conformal symmetry and are described by conformal field theories. Traditionally, physical quantities near the critical point can be computed by perturbative field theory method, where conformal symmetry […]

  • How to steer foundation models?

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    https://youtu.be/ztk5TPYTKZA New Technologies in Mathematics Seminar Speaker: Jimmy Ba, University of Toronto Title: How to steer foundation models? Abstract: By conditioning on natural language instructions, foundation models and large language models (LLMs) have displayed impressive capabilities as general-purpose computers. However, task performance depends significantly on the quality of the prompt used to steer the model. […]

  • Pseudospectrum and black hole quasinormal mode instability: An ultraviolet universality conjecture

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    https://youtu.be/teqIIXRJXd4 General Relativity Seminar Speaker: Jose Luis Jaramillo (Bourgogne U.) Title: Pseudospectrum and black hole quasinormal mode instability: an ultraviolet universality conjecture Abstract: Can we measure the ‘effective regularity’ of spacetime from the perturbation of quasi-normal mode (QNM) overtones? Black hole (BH) QNMs encode the resonant response of black holes under linear perturbations, their associated […]

  • On the free energy of spin glasses with multiple types

    Virtual

    Probability Seminar Speaker: Jean-Christophe Mourrat (ENS Lyon) Title: On the free energy of spin glasses with multiple types Abstract: In the simplest spin-glass model, due to Sherrington and Kirkpatrick, the energy function involves interaction terms between all pairs of spins. A bipartite version of this model can be obtained by splitting the spins into two […]

  • Quantum entropy thermalization

    Virtual

    Quantum Matter Seminar Speaker: Yichen Huang (Harvard) Title: Quantum entropy thermalization Abstract: In an isolated quantum many-body system undergoing unitary evolution, the entropy of a subsystem (smaller than half the system size) thermalizes if at long times, it is to leading order equal to the thermodynamic entropy of the subsystem at the same energy. We […]

  • String theory scalar potentials and their critical points

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Swampland Seminar Speaker: David Andriot (Annecy, LAPTH) Title: String theory scalar potentials and their critical points Abstract: Positive scalar potentials in string effective theories could provide an origin to Dark Energy, responsible for the accelerated expansion of our universe today or during inflation. It is thus crucial to characterize these scalar potentials, namely their slope, […]

  • Randomized algorithms in combinatorics

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Member Seminar Speaker: Michael Simkin Title: Randomized algorithms in combinatorics Abstract: Randomized algorithms have been a computational workhorse for almost as long as there have been computers. Surprisingly, such algorithms can also be used to attack problems that are neither algorithmic nor probabilistic. Time permitting I will discuss the following combintorial examples: Enumerative combinatorics and the […]

  • Active chemical reactions in phase-separating systems

    Virtual

    Active Matter Seminar   Speaker:  Jonathan Bauermann, Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems Title: Active chemical reactions in phase-separating systems Abstract: Motivated by the existence of membrane-less compartments in the chemically active environment of living cells, I will discuss the dynamics of droplets in the presence of active chemical reactions. Therefore, I […]

  • Tensorial TQFT and disentangling modular Walker-Wang models

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Quantum Matter Seminar Speaker: Andreas Bauer  (Freie Universität Berlin) Title: Tensorial TQFT and disentangling modular Walker-Wang models Abstract: I will introduce simple "tensorial" definitions for many algebraic and categorical structures appearing in the classification of topological phases of matter. Such "tensorial TQFTs" will be defined as maps that associate tensors to geometric/topological objects of some […]

  • Quantum Gravity constraints beyond asymptotic regimes

    CMSA Room G10 CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

    Member Seminar Speaker: Max Wiesner Title: Quantum Gravity constraints beyond asymptotic regimes Abstract: Not every effective field theory that is consistent in the absence of gravity can be completed to a consistent theory of quantum gravity. The goal of the Swampland program is to find general criteria that distinguish effective field theories, that can be obtained […]

  • 2023 Ding Shum Lecture

    Harvard Science Center 1 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA

    On March 21, 2023, the CMSA hosted the fourth annual Ding Shum Lecture, given by Cynthia Dwork (Harvard SEAS and Microsoft Research). Time: 5:00-6:00 pm ET Location: Harvard University Science Center Hall D This event was be held in person and via Zoom webinar.   Title: Measuring Our Chances: Risk Prediction in This World and its […]