Mathematics

Patterns are widespread in nature and often form during early development due to the self-organization of cells or other independent agents. One example are zebrafish (Danio rerio): wild-type zebrafish have regular black and gold stripes, while mutants and other fish feature spotty and patchy patterns. Qualitatively, these patterns display impressive consistency and redundancy, yet variability inevitably exists on both microscopic and macroscopic scales. I will first discuss an agent-based model that suggests that both consistency and richness of patterning on zebrafish stems from the presence of redundancy in iridophore interactions. In the second part of my talk, I will focus on how we can quantify features and variability of patterns to facilitate predictive analyses. I will discuss an approach based on topological data analysis for quantifying both agent-level features and global pattern attributes on a large scale. The proposed methodology is able to quantify the differential impact of stochasticity in cell interactions on wild-type and mutant patterns and predicts stripe and spot statistics as a function of varying cellular communication. This is joint work with Alexandria Volkening and Melissa McGuirl.

Naively implemented, statistical procedures are prone to leaking information about their training data, which can be problematic if the data is sensitive. Differential privacy, a rigorous notion of data privacy, offers a principled framework to dealing with these issues. I will survey recent results in differential private statistical estimation, presenting a few vignettes which highlight novel challenges for even the most fundamental problems, and suggesting solutions to address them. Along the way, I’ll mention connections to tools and techniques in a number of fields, including information theory and robust statistics.

A lecture titled "Floer Homology Applications" by Jeff Hicks, University of Edinburgh. This is the 3rd in a series of 3.

General Description:
The idea of stable homotopy refinements of Floer homology was first introduced by Cohen, Jones, and Segal in a 1994 paper, but it was only in the last decade that this idea became a key tool in low-dimensional and symplectic topology. The two crowning achievements of these techniques so far are Manolescu's use of his Pin(2)-equivariant Seiberg–Witten Floer homotopy type to resolve the Triangulation Conjecture and Abouzaid-Blumberg's use of Floer homotopy theory and Morava K-theory to prove the general Arnol'd Conjecture in finite characteristic. During this period, a range of related techniques, included under the umbrella of Floer homotopy theory, have also led to important advances, including involutive Heegaard Floer homology, Smith theory for Lagrangian intersections, homotopy coherence, and further connections between string topology and Floer theory. These in turn have sparked developments in algebraic topology, ranging from developments on Lie algebras in derived algebraic geometry to new computations of equivariant Mahowald invariants to new results on topological Hochschild homology.

The goal of the summer school is to provide participants the tools in symplectic geometry and stable homotopy theory required to work on Floer homotopy theory. Students will come away with a basic understanding of some of the key techniques, questions, and challenges in both of these fields. The summer school may be particularly valuable for participants with a solid understanding of one of the two fields who want to learn more about the other and the connections between them.

A lecture titled "Floer Homology Fundamentals" by Catherine Cannizzo, SCGP. This is the 5th in a series of 9.

General Description:
The idea of stable homotopy refinements of Floer homology was first introduced by Cohen, Jones, and Segal in a 1994 paper, but it was only in the last decade that this idea became a key tool in low-dimensional and symplectic topology. The two crowning achievements of these techniques so far are Manolescu's use of his Pin(2)-equivariant Seiberg–Witten Floer homotopy type to resolve the Triangulation Conjecture and Abouzaid-Blumberg's use of Floer homotopy theory and Morava K-theory to prove the general Arnol'd Conjecture in finite characteristic. During this period, a range of related techniques, included under the umbrella of Floer homotopy theory, have also led to important advances, including involutive Heegaard Floer homology, Smith theory for Lagrangian intersections, homotopy coherence, and further connections between string topology and Floer theory. These in turn have sparked developments in algebraic topology, ranging from developments on Lie algebras in derived algebraic geometry to new computations of equivariant Mahowald invariants to new results on topological Hochschild homology.

The goal of the summer school is to provide participants the tools in symplectic geometry and stable homotopy theory required to work on Floer homotopy theory. Students will come away with a basic understanding of some of the key techniques, questions, and challenges in both of these fields. The summer school may be particularly valuable for participants with a solid understanding of one of the two fields who want to learn more about the other and the connections between them.

A lecture titled "Floer Homology Fundamentals" by Catherine Cannizzo, SCGP. This is the 3rd in a series of 9.

General Description:
The idea of stable homotopy refinements of Floer homology was first introduced by Cohen, Jones, and Segal in a 1994 paper, but it was only in the last decade that this idea became a key tool in low-dimensional and symplectic topology. The two crowning achievements of these techniques so far are Manolescu's use of his Pin(2)-equivariant Seiberg–Witten Floer homotopy type to resolve the Triangulation Conjecture and Abouzaid-Blumberg's use of Floer homotopy theory and Morava K-theory to prove the general Arnol'd Conjecture in finite characteristic. During this period, a range of related techniques, included under the umbrella of Floer homotopy theory, have also led to important advances, including involutive Heegaard Floer homology, Smith theory for Lagrangian intersections, homotopy coherence, and further connections between string topology and Floer theory. These in turn have sparked developments in algebraic topology, ranging from developments on Lie algebras in derived algebraic geometry to new computations of equivariant Mahowald invariants to new results on topological Hochschild homology.

The goal of the summer school is to provide participants the tools in symplectic geometry and stable homotopy theory required to work on Floer homotopy theory. Students will come away with a basic understanding of some of the key techniques, questions, and challenges in both of these fields. The summer school may be particularly valuable for participants with a solid understanding of one of the two fields who want to learn more about the other and the connections between them.