Geometry & Topology RTG

University of Notre Dame

Undergraduate summer workshop

July 30 - August 3, 2018

This is a week long event with two components: Part I, where basic concepts in geometry and topology will be introduced, followed by Part II, which will be a workshop aimed at more advanced undergraduates. Participants can attend part I, part II, or both. See the poster.

Funding is available for domestic travel and lodging. Apply at mathprograms.org and see here for the 2017 program.


Part I: A first glimpse

July 30 - August 1
Speakers: Mark Behrens, Rosemary Guzman

The first two and a half days of the workshop will have two or three short courses assuming very little mathematical background. Potential topics are: "What is a manifold?", "What is curvature?", "Knot theory", and "Hyperbolic geometry". A typical participant in this part would have taken a Calculus sequence as well as a few other math courses such as Linear Algebra. Part I will consist of lectures by Mark Behrens and Rosemary Guzman, with active learning components facilitated by graduate student mentors.

Part I Schedule


Part II: Advanced topics

August 1 - 3

The last two and a half days of the workshop will consist of talks outlining more advanced topics of current research interest. In addition there will be an undergraduate presentation session where undergraduates can present their research. Some background in topology or geometry will be assumed from the participants.

Faculty talks and Short Research Reports are in 231 Hayes-Healy
Coffee breaks are in the Math Department Lounge
Problem sessions will be in two rooms, 231 Hayes Healy and 129 Hayes Healy.

Schedule

Wednesday 8/1
1:30 pm Liviu Nicolaescu The many faces of the Gauss-Bonnet theorem
2:30 pm Coffee break
3:00 pm Richard Hind Quantitative symplectic geometry
4:15 pm Short Research Reports S. Cetin, J. Erickson, M. Figging, B. Gales, S. Haney
6:00 pm Cookout
Thursday 8/2
9:30 am Gabor Szekelyhidi Closed geodesics
10:30 am Problem Session
12:15-2:00 pm Lunch break
2:00 pm Katrina Barron Algebraic structures "governed" by geometric surfaces and applications to string theory
3:00 pm Coffee break
3:15 pm Short Research Reports C. Hatton, I. Marchenka, S. Slaoui
4:15 pm Pavel Mnev Moduli spaces of flat connections
Friday 8/3
9:30 am Qing Han The isometric embedding of surfaces in 3-dimensional Euclidean space
10:30 am Coffee break
11:00 am Mark Behrens Homotopy groups
12:00 - 1:30 pm Lunch break
1:30 - 3:30 pm Problem Session