Michaelmas
7 Things That You Should Know About Prime Numbers, by Dr Vicky Neale
Thursday, 11th October 2012, 6pm
Dr Vicky Neale, whose research interests are in Analytic Number Theory and Additive Combinatorics, presents 7 Things That You Should Know About Prime Numbers. This is our first talk of the year and will be accessible to first year students.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm.
The Nottingham Group, by Dr Rachel Camina
Thursday, 1st November 2012, 6pm
The Nottingham group is an infinite group that can be largely understood by studying its finite quotients. We will define the group and look at some of its interesting properties.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5:30pm and Dr Rachel Camina will join us in Hall after the talk. Everyone is welcome.
What Would Newton Do?, by Prof David Tong
Thursday, 8th November 2012, 6pm
Newton was somewhat reluctant to share his ideas with the world. Rather than revealing the development of calculus, he instead chose to present all the proofs in his Principia using geometry alone. Following Newton, in this lecture I will give a geometrical derivation of Kepler’s laws of planetary motion, the highlight of the Principia. We’ll use only geometry that a 15 year old could understand. (Although, in fairness, they would probably have to be quite a smart 15 year old).
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm.
When Hardy Met Dirac, by Dr Ben Garling
Thursday, 15th November 2012, 6pm
G.H. Hardy was elected Sadleirian Professor in 1931, and Paul Dirac was elected Lucasian Professor in 1932. Hardy is famous as a Number Theorist, and Dirac as a Nobel Prizewinning Theoretical Physicist. Did they ever discuss their mathematical ideas? Probably not. Had they done so, they might have been very surprised.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm and Dr Ben Garling will join us in Hall after the talk. Everyone is welcome.
Lent
Non-Commutative Gaussian Elimination and Rubik’s Cube, by Prof Dror Bar-Natan
Wednesday, 23rd January 2013, 6pm
A simple generalization of Gaussian elimination to a non-commutative setting allows us to solve the cube and a dozen other permutation group puzzles in no effort at all.
A recording of the talk can viewed on Prof Bar-Natan’s website here. Prof Dror Bar-Natan is a Professor at the University of Toronto.
Slicing a Football in 4-Dimensional Space, by Prof Ieke Moerdijk
Wednesday, 30th January 2013, 6pm
Professor Ieke Moerdijk from Radboud University Nijmegen presents an introduction to Hopf fibrations.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm.
Quantum Teleportation and Nonlocality, by Prof Richard Jozsa
Wednesday, 6th February 2013, 6pm
Since its discovery in the early 1900’s, quantum mechanics has offered a strangely enigmatic picture of the physical world. Yet some of its simplest and most tantalising key features have only recently become properly appreciated. In this talk we will discuss some of these, focusing especially on the process of quantum teleportation and some of its curious features.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm.
Grand Prix 1860 and the Number of Values of a Function, by Dr Peter Neumann
Thursday, 21st February 2013, 6pm
In 1857 the Academie des Sciences in Paris announced the subject for its 1860 Grand Prix de Mathematiques. It was to be about the number of values of well-defined functions. Although that may mean little (or something very different) to us now, it was a central problem of the time and it stimulated interest in the then new theory of groups. This talk will be about some 19th century mathematics and about the early history of the theory of groups.
Refreshments will be served in the Fisher Building foyer from 5.30pm.
Easter
Adams Society Garden Party
Saturday, 15th June 2013, 6pm
No description of this event was given this year (or it has been lost to time).