Program on Classical, quantum, and probabilistic integrable systems - novel interactions and applications Dates: March 24–May 24, 2025 Location: CMSA, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge MA 02138 Exactly solvable models have played pivotal roles in mathematics and physics throughout their history. The program is dedicated to exploring and developing a more recent wave of their influence […]
Colloquium Speaker: Peter Sarnak, IAS & Princeton University Title: Bass-Note Spectra of locally uniform geometries Abstract: We formulate and report on the problem of the Bass-Note Spectrum of an invariant operator as one varies over locally uniform geometries. In the Euclidean setting this recasts classical problems of Mahler from the geometry of numbers in a new […]
Geometry and Quantum Theory Seminar Speakers: Anadil Saeed Rao (Northeastern) and Vasily Krylov (CMSA/Harvard) Title: Algebraic approach to the bow construction Abstract: Anadil will finish his part of the talk. Vasily will then explain how to understand moduli spaces of instantons on R^4, monopoles on R^3, and instantons on Taub-NUT spaces algebraically as so-called bow varieties. We […]
Mathematical Physics and Algebraic Geometry Seminar Speaker: Fabian Hahner, University of Washington Title: From superspace to twisted supergravity Abstract: In this talk, I will present a geometric perspective on the pure spinor superfield formalism, which proves fruitful for studying twisted supergravity. For eleven-dimensional supergravity, we use this technique to construct the full interacting theory together with […]
Member Seminar Speaker: Han Shao, Harvard CMSA Title: Incentives for data sharing in federated learning Abstract: Federated learning has recently emerged as a powerful approach for enabling collaboration across large populations of learning agents. However, agents may have incentives to defect from the collaboration—that is, to withdraw or contribute less data than expected—due to the […]
Colloquium Speaker: Ariel Procaccia, Harvard University Title: Thinking Outside the Ballot Box Abstract: How should one design unprecedented democratic processes capable of handling enormous sets of alternatives like all possible policies, bills, or statements? I argue that this challenge can be addressed through a framework called generative social choice, which fuses the rigor of social choice theory […]
Mathematical Physics and Algebraic Geometry Seminar Speaker: Zhenping Gui, Shanghai Institute for Mathematics and Interdisciplinary Sciences Title: Residues and homotopy Lie algebras Abstract: I will introduce the notion of a chiral operad for any compact Riemann surface. This operad consists of compositions of residue operations, which give rise to the Chevalley-Cousin complex and lead to the […]
Member Seminar Speaker: Sergiy Verstyuk, Harvard CMSA Title: Asset pricing with heterogeneous agents Abstract: This talk will introduce the basics of continuous-time finance, discuss important existing theories and models, as well as present some new asset pricing results in a setting with many heterogeneous investors. (Joint work with Puskar Mondal.)
Quantum Field Theory and Physical Mathematics Seminar Speaker: Nikita Sopenko, IAS Title: An index for 2d invertible phases of quantum many-body systems
Colloquium Speaker: Anna Seigal, Harvard University Title: Factorizations for data analysis Abstract: We can find structure in data by factoring it into building blocks, which should be interpretable for the context at hand. A classical example is principal component analysis (PCA), which uses the eigendecomposition of the covariance matrix to find axes of variation in a dataset. Starting from […]
Conference Reports Speaker: Hugo Cui, Harvard CMSA Title: Report on the Perimeter Institute Theory+AI Workshop Abstract: I will give a survey and brief summary of some of the talks given at the Theory+AI Workshop: Theoretical Physics for AI event organized by Perimeter Institute in April, on approaches to machine learning theory inspired from physics. Link : https://events.perimeterinstitute.ca/event/993/
Mathematical Physics and Algebraic Geometry Seminar Speaker: Claudia Rella (IHES) Title: Resurgence, number theory, and quantum mirror curves Abstract: Resurgence provides a powerful toolbox to access the non-perturbative sectors hidden within the divergent asymptotic series of quantum theories. Under some special assumptions, the non-perturbative data extracted via resurgent methods possess intrinsic number-theoretic properties that are deeply […]
Member Seminar Speaker: Samy Jelassi, CMSA Title: Echo Chamber: RL Post-training Amplifies Behaviors Learned in Pretraining Abstract: Reinforcement Learning has become a crucial step in training state-of-the-art language models such as DeepSeek-R1 for solving mathematical problems. In this talk, I will first review the mechanisms of Reinforcement Learning fine-tuning. Then, I will present a systematic end-to-end […]
Mathematical Physics and Algebraic Geometry Seminar Speaker: Joaquin Liniado, Instituto de Física La Plata Title: Higher Gauge Theory and Integrability Abstract: Integrable field theories are remarkable for possessing an infinite number of conserved quantities, which often allow for their exact solvability. In two dimensions, this structure is elegantly captured by the existence of a Lax […]