CMSA Q&A Seminar Speaker: Shaoyun Bai, MIT Title: What is a virtual fundamental cycle? (ICM Series: On the work of John Pardon) Abstract: One of Pardon’s important contribution to symplectic topology is a new approach to constructing virtual fundamental cycles/chains for moduli spaces of pseudo-holomorphic maps. As a former PhD student of John, my own […]
Geometry and Mathematical Physics Seminar Speaker: John Alexander Cruz Morales, Universidad Nacional de Colombia Title: Towards a Hodge theoretic mirror symmetry for punctured surfaces Abstract: In their 1992 paper, “Ising Model and N=2 Supersymmetric Theories,” Cecotti and Vafa asserted that a certain hyperelliptic configuration space of chiral fields is mirror to the Ising model. Today, this statement can […]
AI for the Working Mathematician Speaker: Jordan Ellenberg, University of Wisconsin-Madison Title: Large Hypercubes Abstract: I'll talk about this paper: Bruhat intervals that are large hypercubes <arxiv.org/abs/2601.01235> in which we use a tool from Google, AlphaEvolve, to discover unexpected combinatorial structures inside the symmetric group (to be precise, a large hypercube in the Bruhat order.) I'll […]
Joint Math/CMSA Geometry and Quantum Theory Seminar Speaker: Bowen Yang Title: From Random Walks to the Free Quantum Field Abstract: The free quantum field is, heuristically, a Gaussian measure with density exp(−S_E) on a space of fields. We make this precise by building the Gaussian free field from discrete objects: random walks, Brownian motion, and […]
CMSA Q&A Seminar Title: Discussion on OpenAI Math Papers Abstract: You have likely seen that OpenAI released 722 math papers. For the Q&A meeting on Wednesday October 14, we would like to gather to discuss them and hear informal, short presentations (say 10 minutes maximum) from anyone who is engaging with at least one of the […]
New Technologies in Mathematics Seminar Speaker: Tianyi Peng, Decision, Risk, and Operations Division, Columbia Business School Title: Prove2Me: Formalizing Fermat Last Theorem and Beyond Abstract: Proof assistants such as Lean 4 promise the paradigm of formally verified mathematics, but large-scale formalization projects have faced major barriers to entry, including the need for expertise in formal verification […]
AI for the Working Mathematician Speaker: Lauren Williams, Harvard Title: First Proof Batch 3: Mathematicians putting AI to the test Abstract: First Proof is an initiative that aims to obtain a nuanced, objective assessment about the capabilities of large language models to prove specified mathematical statements. I will report on the results of First Proof's third […]
Geometry and Mathematical Physics Seminar Speaker: Spiro Karigiannis, University of Waterloo Title: A tale of two Lie groups Abstract: The classical Lie group SO(4) is well-known to possess a very rich structure, relating in several ways to complex Euclidean spaces. This structure can be used to construct the classical twistor space Z over an oriented […]
Member Seminar Speaker: Yiqi Liu Title: An Introduction to Statistical Inference for Partially Identified Models Abstract: Classical statistical inference often relies on asymptotic approximations that are valid for each fixed data-generating process but may fail to hold uniformly over a class of relevant distributions. Starting with the familiar t-test, I will illustrate why this distinction […]
Dates: October 19 & 21, 2026 Time: 4:00–5:00 pm ET Location: Science Center - Zimmer Hall Lecture Hall D and via Zoom Webinar In-person registration Webinar Registration Speaker: Daniel Litt, University of Toronto & Benedict H. Gross Distinguished Visitor, Harvard Mathematics Department Monday, October 19, 2026 Lecture 1: The arithmetic of differential equations Abstract: […]
CMSA Q&A Seminar Speaker: Robert M. Freund, MIT Title: What is a self-concordant barrier function?, and what is an accelerated first-order algorithm? (ICM Series: On the work of Yurii Nesterov) Abstract: The two most impactful contributions of Nesterov on both theory and computation in optimization are (i) self-concordant barriers for interior-point methods in convex optimization, and (ii) […]
New Technologies in Mathematics Seminar Speaker: Riccardo Zecchina (Bocconi University) Title: Local learning needs dendrites Abstract: I will present a learning scheme for recurrent networks in which nonlinear dendrites enable learning by generating and stabilizing task-relevant attractors within a representation manifold. The scheme is local in space and time and matches the performance of backpropagation […]