Spring 2008 schedule

Autumn 2007 schedule

Spring 2007 schedule

Autumn 2006 schedule

Spring 2006 schedule

Autumn 2005 schedule

Spring 2005 schedule

Autumn 2004 schedule

Spring 2004 schedule

Mathematics Department Colloquium : Autumn 2008 schedule

 

   Monday, September 22, 1530-1630 (OBS! This talk was due to be held September 15, but speaker fell ill)

SPEAKER : Bo Berndtsson, MV.

TITLE : Complex Brunn-Minkowski inequalities.

ABSTRACT : The classical Brunn-Minkowski theorem is an inequality for volumes of convex bodies in R^n. The natural generalization of convexity to complex space is pseudoconvexity, and we will discuss a theorem of Brunn-Minkowski type in this setting. It has been observed long ago that the naive counterpart of Brunn Minkowski's theorem to C^n fails, but there is a (less naive) version that goes through. This sheds some light on the classical result and also turns out to have interesting applications to algebraic geometry and Kähler geometry.

 

   Monday, September 29, 1530-1630

SPEAKER : Jörgen Weibull, Handelshögskolan, Stockholm.

TITLE : Committee decisions : Optimality and Equilibrium.

ABSTRACT : We consider a group or committee that faces a binary decision under uncertainty. Each member holds some private information. Members agree which decision should be taken in each state of nature, had this been known, but they may attach different values to the two types of mistake that may occur. Most voting rules have a plethora of uninformative equilibria, and informative voting may be incompatible with equilibrium. We analyze an anonymous randomized majority rule that has a unique equilibrium. This equilibrium is strict, votes are informative, and the equilibrium implements the optimal decision with probability one in the limit as the committee size goes to infinity. We show that this also holds for the usual majority rule under certain perturbations of the behavioral assumptions: (i) a slight preference for voting according to one's conviction, and (ii) transparency and a slight preference for esteem. We also show that a slight probability for voting mistakes strengthens the incentive for informative voting. This is joint work with Jean-Francois Laslier.

 

   Monday, November 24, 1530-1630

SPEAKERS : Uno Nävert, Johan Carlson, Fredrik Edelvik and Mats Jirstrand, Fraunhofer Center Chalmers (FCC)

TITLE : FCC - Mathematics as a Technology.

ABSTRACT : We give an introduction to FCC and a survey of our applications and research in geometry and motion planning, computational engineering and design, and systems biology and bioimaging.

 

   Monday, December 8, 1530-1630

SPEAKERS : Serik Sagitov, Chalmers MV.

TITLE : Top 25 questions on branching processes (OBS! This is Serik's inaugural lecture after his appointment to Biträdande Professor).

ABSTRACT : The theory of branching processes has been an important research subject in our department (Peter J, Olle N, Torgny L, Ziad T, Serik S, Marina A-F, Erik B, Bo B, Olav K, Peter O, Andreas L, Sao S, Ali F, Per B, Ulrica O, Anders G). Dozens of leading experts (from Sweden, Denmark, Lithuania, Germany, France, Russia, UK, Bulgaria, Spain, USA, Canada, Australia, China, Holland, Ukraine ....) have visited our department on numerous occasions.

I will start my lecture by generating random trees through letting a die decide how many branches should grow from a given vertex. Then I will try to navigate the audience toward the most natural problems for this basic branching process. We proceed by looking for meaningful generalizations of the basic model and new questions to ask.

In this way the audience will hopefully get a broad overview of the achievements and challenges of the theory of branching processes and its applications.

 

   Monday, December 15, 1530-1630

SPEAKERS : Ove Granstand, Industrial Organisation, Chalmers.

TITLE : Mathematical developments in and of Industrial Economics - towards a research agenda.

ABSTRACT : In my talk, I will take up the following topics :

1. Short intro about growing math inputs to economics and the lesser reverse relation

2. Investment theory and financial engineering

3. The "new" endogenous economic growth theory and its ODE-systems

4. Theories of the firm and mathematical programming modelling

5. Valuation and pricing models with problems, e.g.: of extremely skewed (fat-tailed) distributions

6. Miscellanous other applications of mathematics in economics (if time and interests permit, e.g.: Coase theorem in environmental economics, logic/algebra in law and economics)