Math Kitchen Party: organized by Danielle Cox (Mount Saint Vincent)
2020-07-16 20:00 - 21:00 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Modelling correlated count data-can I delete the zeroes?
Gary Sneddon (Mount Saint Vincent)
Correlated count data with excess zeroes arise in a number of applications. We will discuss 3 motivating examples, and some approaches to modelling these type of data. Covid-19 may be mentioned, so be prepared. This is joint work with Tariqul Hasan and Renjun Ma of UNB (Fredericton).
The Shooter’s Hill Decorative Tiles: Combinatorics as Art
Karyn McLellan (Mount Saint Vincent)
This talk will explore some of the art and mathematics inspired by a mistakenly (?) placed stone tile on a terraced house in London. A set of 70 Truchet-type tiles are the building blocks for various art pieces, including an inkle loom weaving. In particular, we are interested in whether or not we can weave an overlapping strip containing all 70 tiles exactly once, and if so, how many such strips exist. Other combinatorial properties of the tiles are examined as well. Joint work with Eva Knoll(UQAM) and Danielle Cox (MSVU).
Musical Guests

Sean & Tessa Sneddon

This is a virtual zoom meeting. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.
[more information about the Math Kitchen Party summer talk series]

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: Sana Jahedi (UNB) and James A. Yorke (Maryland)
2020-07-15 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
When the best pandemic models are the simplest
As a pandemic of coronavirus spreads across the globe, people debate policies to mitigate its severity.
Many complex, highly detailed models have been developed to help policy setters make better decisions. However, the basis of these models is unlikely to be understood by non-experts.
We describe the advantages of simple models for covid-19. We say a model is “simple’’ if its only parameter is the rate of contact between people in the population. Such models can be understood by a broad audience, and thus can be helpful in explaining the policy decisions to the public. They can be used to evaluate outcomes of different policy strategies. However, simple models have a disadvantage when dealing with inhomogeneous populations.
To augment the power of a simple model to evaluate complicated situations, we add what we call “satellite’’ equations that do not change the original model.
To compare simple models with complex models, we introduce our “slightly complex’’ Model J. We find the conclusions of simple and complex models can be quite similar. But, for each added complexity, a modeler may have to choose additional parameter values for which there is often little rationale but that can have a big impact on predictions. Our simulations suggest that the added complexity offers little predictive advantage.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

CMS COVID-19 Research and Education Meeting (CCREM)
2020-07-13 - 2020-07-16 | Virtual Meeting
The CMS had to postpone the 2020 CMS Summer Meeting planned for this June due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Since we cannot hold a meeting in person, the CMS still wants to provide a virtual platform for mathematicians to come together and learn during this difficult time. We feel that a meeting focused on the changes caused by COVID-19 to the way we plan, teach and do research would be of great benefit to the Canadian mathematical community.
The session will cover NSERC’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic including new funding opportunities for researchers, changes in policies for NSERC Discovery grants and scholarship and fellowship programs. NSERC staff will also be answering questions regarding the coming Discovery grant competition.

Quantum Gravity 2020
2020-07-13 - 2020-07-17 | Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, 31 Caroline Street North, Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 2Y5, Canada
The conference “Quantum Gravity 2020“ has a deliberately broad scope. We aim to include participants from all current approaches to quantum gravity, as well as researchers working on the phenomenology of quantum gravity. The main goal of the meeting is to assess the progress made and to constructively and openly discuss open questions in our understanding of quantum gravity.
A second goal is to work towards combining the insights gained in the various approaches. In its overall goal as well as the format, this conference will differ from more specialized meetings that focus on specific quantum-gravity approaches.
We hope that this inaugural conference “Quantum Gravity“ can make a contribution to bridging the gaps between quantum gravity approaches, and bring the entire community together for a constructive and fruitful exchange.

Math Kitchen Party: organized by Daniele Turchetti (Dalhousie)
2020-07-09 20:00 - 21:00 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Number Theory in Quantum Mechanics
Suresh Eswarathasan (Dalhousie | 8:00-8:20)
In this lecture, I will discuss some concrete connections between two seemingly disparate fields: number theory and quantum mechanics. The first 10 minutes will be spent giving some “standard” facts in these disciplines before spending the last 10 minutes on the implications of the Sum of Two Squares Theorem (or rather, its refinements) on certain quantum waves.
Getting Back to Your Roots
Jason Brown (Dalhousie | 8:40-9:00)
Polynomials arise in various combinatorial settings, and their roots are of interest for both applied and theoretical reasons. In this talk I’ll provide a few examples, and show how exploring the nature and location of the roots can connect us back to giants of the past, such as Newton, Gauss, Hermite and Julia.
Musical Interlude

Dorette Pronk (Dalhousie)

This is a virtual zoom meeting. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.
[more information about the Math Kitchen Party summer talk series]

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: Matthew Betti (Mount Allison)* and Jane Heffernan (York)
2020-07-08 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Scenario-based modeling of healthcare demand and PPE usage during the COVID-19 pandemic
One of the big risks during the current pandemic is stress and overburdening of the healthcare system, and a possible scarcity of resources. We will present a three module model that projects possible epidemic outcomes and subsequently measures healthcare demand and PPE usage for different jurisdictions across Canada. We present as well a simple model which we fit to current cases with some novel sampling techniques which allows us to narrow possible trajectories which can then be fed into the healthcare demand and PPE modules. We show results for possible outcomes from each of our three modules and from our fitting techniques.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

Math Kitchen Party: organized by Branimir Cacic (UNB Fredericton)
2020-07-02 20:00 - 21:00 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
The Oberwolfach Problem
Andrea Burgess (UNB Saint John)
The Oberwolfach Problem was posed by Ringel as a seating problem: people attend a conference in Oberwolfach, where the dining room has round tables of sizes (with ). Is it possible to devise a seating plan over successive dinners in which each person sits next to each other person exactly once?
In graph-theoretical terms, the Oberwolfach Problem asks whether, given a 2-factor of order , the complete graph can be decomposed into copies of . In this talk, we present solutions of the Oberwolfach Problem obtained via graceful labellings. This is joint work with Peter Danziger (Ryerson) and Tommaso Traetta (Brescia).
The Unitary Birkhoff-von Neumann theorem
Stijn De Baerdemacker (UNB Fredericton)
Birkhoff has shown that the doubly stochastic matrices can be written as a weighted sum over the permutation matrices of the same dimension. I will show that a similar theorem holds for unitary matrices with equal linesum, and talk about applications in quantum computing.
Musical Guests

TBA

This is a virtual zoom meeting. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.
[more information about the Math Kitchen Party summer talk series]

Math Kitchen Party: organized by Patrick Reynolds (UNB Fredericton)
2020-06-25 20:00 - 21:00 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Source Sink Diffusion
Danielle Cox (MSVU)
We will introduce the diffusion process on graphs with the addition of sources and sinks. In particular, we will provide some results regarding the periodicity of the process. This is joint work with Todd Mullen (Dalhousie University), Shayne Breen (MSVU), Emily Wright (MSVU) and Jesse Preston (MSVU).
More Fun with the Sierpinski Relatives
Tara Taylor (StFX)
The Sierpinski gasket is a well-known fractal that can be described as the attractor of an iterated function system (IFS) that maps the unit square to three smaller squares (scaled down by 2). A Sierpinski relative is a fractal that is an attractor of an IFS that maps the unit square to three smaller squares but also involves the symmetries of the square. This is an interesting class of fractals because they all have the same fractal dimension but different topologies. Some are totally disconnected, some are disconnected with straight line segments, some are simply-connected, and some are multiply-connected. This very brief talk will explore different ways to compare and characterize the fractals that go beyond the fractal dimension. We will focus on the subclass that are disconnected with straight line segments, and this will involve convex hulls and epsilon-hulls.
Musical Guests

Patrick Reynolds

This is a virtual zoom meeting. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.
[more information about the Math Kitchen Party summer talk series]

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
2020-06-24 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
The Euler’s method and the Gillespie algorithm to simulate a stochastic SIR model (part 2)
JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
The second part of this presentation will be used to talk about some example of extensions to the stochastic SIR model. We will start with adding compartments that leave the fundamental structure of the model unchanged, like the ones that add a latent class or add compartments to accommodate for metapopulations, as well as incorporating the serial-time distribution to model the infectious process.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

AARMS CRG conference on Computational Aspects in Finance and Actuarial Sciences
2020-06-19 - 2020-06-20 | University of Prince Edward Island, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada
The AARMS CRG Conference on Computational Aspects in Finance and Actuarial Sciences will be held June 19-20th, 2020 in PEI, Canada. This conference is mainly hosted by the Atlantic Association for Research in Mathematical Sciences (AARMS) collaborative research group (CRG) and the School of Mathematical and Computational Sciences (SMCS) at University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI), Canada, and is a unique venue that brings together leaders in finance, and actuarial sciences, across disciplines, and across borders, tackling very important and timely topics in finance and actuarial sciences. Our intention for this conference is to have a broad scope in terms of applications in Finance and Actuarial Sciences but we would like to put emphasis on numerical and computational issues (including trendy topics such as machine learning algorithms in finance and insurance, but also more traditional methods such as numerical solutions for PDEs, Monte Carlo simulations, etc). The conference will include a dynamic program with high quality speakers focusing on innovative research, policy discussions, and business challenges and successes.

Math Kitchen Party: organized by Tim Alderson (UNB Saint John)
2020-06-18 20:00 - 21:00 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Pokemon in the City
Danny Dyer (Memorial University of Newfoundland)
When playing Pokemon Go, trying to catch all the Pokemon in a big, grid like city is difficult, but can be discussed in terms of the watchman number of grid graphs. We present some bounds for these graphs, and argue that is better to play Pokemon Go on a toroidal space station. Gotta catch ‘em all! [Joint work with Jared Howell, Grenfell Campus, Memorial University.]
Passing the buck: a chip firing game
M.E. Messenger (Mount Allison)
Suppose a group of people sitting in a row, each take out their wallets and count their money. Then the richest person (or people), pass a dollar to their neighbours. Lather, rinse, repeat. We will discuss some of the dynamics of such a process and present a few results. We’ll also pose some questions and welcome solutions from the audience. [Joint work with Jared Howell, Grenfell Campus, Memorial University.]
Musical Guests

Jason Brown (Dalhousie)
Iain Beaton (Dalhousie)

This is a virtual zoom meeting. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.
[more information about the Math Kitchen Party summer talk series]

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: Mathieu Chalifoux (Government of New Brunswick)
2020-06-17 15:00 - 16:30 UTC | Zoom seminar
Planning for Covid-19: Government’s informational needs in a time of uncertainty
Mathieu Chalifoux (Government of New Brunswick)
In this presentation, we will go over three questions that have recently been posed to the mathematical sciences community in Fredericton, New Brunswick as a means to better understand and plan for the incidence of COVID-19 in the coming months. Further discussion will ensue with all participants as a means to discuss what type of information is useful to governments during this ongoing pandemic.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

Queer and Trans Mathematicians in Combinatorics - CANCELLED
2020-06-12 - 2020-06-14 | Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
The Queer and Trans Mathematicians in Combinatorics conference (QTMC) is a first-ever event in combinatorics specifically aimed at queer and trans mathematicians. It aims to bring together and support queer and trans combinatorists. The conference promotes a supportive and active collaborative environment for the participants and aims to bring about visibility to an otherwise underrepresented invisible minority in the combinatorics community. The QTMCis heavily geared toward students, postdocs and early career mathematicians who are queer and/or trans.

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: JC Loredo-Osti (MUN) - POSTPONED
2020-06-10 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
The Euler’s method and the Gillespie algorithm to simulate a stochastic SIR model (part 2)
JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
The second part of this presentation will be used to talk about some example of extensions to the stochastic SIR model. We will start with adding compartments that leave the fundamental structure of the model unchanged, like the ones that add a latent class or add compartments to accommodate for metapopulations, as well as incorporating the serial-time distribution to model the infectious process.
This seminar has been postponed due to #ShutDownSTEM. A new date will be announced soon.

CMS Special Session: Designs and Codes
2020-06-05 - 2020-06-08 | University of Ottawa, 75 Laurier Ave E, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada
Designs and codes are very active areas of research in combinatorics. There have been numerous breakthroughs in recent years, such as the existence proof for Steiner systems for arbitrary values of t. Research in designs, codes and their interaction includes both mathematical and algorithmic questions. Proofs encompass both constructions and probabilistic methods, and employ diverse mathematical techniques from algebra, number theory, graph theory, etc. In addition, there are numerous applications, in areas such as cryptography, in which designs and codes play an important role.
This session brings together leading and emerging researchers in the field to share their recent results, techniques, and applications.Univ

CMS Special Session: Graph Decompositions
2020-06-05 - 2020-06-08 | University of Ottawa, 75 Laurier Ave E, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada
Decomposition of graphs, particularly decomposition into cycles, is a vibrant area of research in the intersection of graph theory and the theory of combinatorial designs. For almost two centuries, professional as well as amateur mathematicians have been intrigued by problems that are easy to state yet extremely difficult to solve. In the last couple of decades, we have witnessed an explosion of new results, including new techniques and solutions to many long-outstanding problems; however, many fundamental problems remain unsolved.
The session in Graph Decompositions at the CMS 75th Anniversary Summer Meeting will bring together leading and emerging researchers in the field to share their recent results, techniques, and applications.
This session is dedicated to Louise Duffield Cummings, a Canadian-born mathematician who contributed influential results in the study of triple systems. The year 2020 marks the 150th anniversary of her birth.

CMS Special Session: Numerical Analysis and Computational Geophysics
2020-06-05 - 2020-06-08 | University of Ottawa, 75 Laurier Ave E, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada
Modelling the composition and the dynamic of the Earth subsurface is a difficult problem, which requires the implementation of efficient numerical methods for partial differential equations and of advanced statistical methods for analyzing experimental data as well as comparing them with synthetic data produced by mathematical models. In this session we will bring together mathematicians and geophysicists to present and discuss some trends in geophysical modelling and computational geophysics.
Topics will include the following:
-Domain decomposition methods (optimized Schwarz methods) and their applications to geophysics
-Mimetic finite difference discretization methods and their application to gravity and magnetotelluric methods in geophysics
-Mathematical and statistical methods for seismic wavefield inversion
-Computational software for simulation and parameter estimation in geophysics

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
2020-06-03 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
The Euler’s method and the Gillespie algorithm to simulate a stochastic SIR model (part 1)
JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
In this presentation, we will discuss the implementation of the two more common procedures to simulate a stochastic compartmentalised epidemic model, the Euler’s method and the Gillespie algorithm. We will also talk about extensions to the stochastic SIR model, as for example, the two ways to include a compartment for asymptomatic cases as well as extensions to account for a non-homogeneous process to accommodate for a non-exponential serial time distribution.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

Connecting Women in Mathematics Across Canada - CANCELLED
2020-06-03 - 2020-06-04 | Carleton University, 1125 Colonel By Dr., Ottawa, Ontario, K1S 5B6, Canada
The CWiMAC workshops are developed and organized in coordination with the CMS Women in Mathematics Committee. The purpose of these workshops is to support the career development of junior women academics in the Canadian mathematics community. These events have been highly successful in the past. The goal is to hold this workshop roughly every two years. The last CWiMAC workshop was held in 2014, and it is timely to organize another one. This workshop will be held at the University of Ottawa on the evening of Wednesday, June 3 and all day on Thursday, June 4, 2020, immediately preceding the 75th Anniversary Meeting of the Canadian Mathematical Society in Ottawa. The goal of this event is to provide female-identified researchers in mathematics skills to help them succeed, to ensure their continued success and retention in mathematics.

Calculus Instruction in Atlantic Canada Symposium 2020 - CANCELLED
2020-05-29 - 2020-05-30 | Saint Francis Xavier University, 4130 University Avenue, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, B2G 2W5, Canada
Calculus Instruction in Atlantic Canada Symposium 2020 will have the theme of Helping High School and University students to Deepen Their Understanding of Calculus. It will be held at STFX on May 29-30, 2020 and Atlantic Canadian high school educators, as well as university educators will be invited. The goal of this symposium is to give participants the opportunity to hear from experts and engage in discussions regarding ways to help students with conceptual understanding of calculus through specific examples and applications. We will also address feedback from students. The structure of the symposium will include plenary talks and a panel of university and high school educators. There will be small group discussions, as well as contributed talks.

Atlantic General Relativity Meeting 2020 - CANCELLED
2020-05-25 - 2020-05-29 | Bishops University, 2600 College St, Sherbrooke, Quebec, J1M 1Z7, Canada
The annual Atlantic General Relativity Conference (AGR2020) is scheduled to be hosted at Bishop’s University in Sherbrooke, Québec during May 25-29, 2020. The Atlantic General Relativity Conference series of meetings has been a regular and annual feature of the Atlantic general relativity community for nearly three decades, and has recently developed to include more international participation. This series of meetings focuses on recent developments in all aspects of classical, quantum, and mathematical gravity and its goals include the dissemination of recent results, the circulation of ideas and methods, as well as the training of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.

StFX-AARMS-CMS Math Camp - CANCELLED
2020-05-22 - 2020-05-24 | Saint Francis Xavier University, 4130 University Avenue, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, B2G 2W5, Canada
The StFX-CMS Math Camp is a two and a half day camp which begins at 9:00 am on a Friday and end by 11:30 am on Sunday. There are several presentations by professors to expose the participants to exciting topics and applications in the mathematical sciences. In addition there are several sessions on math trivia, math relays, and team problem solving to help inspire the participants about the breadth and applicability of the mathematical sciences. It is anticipated that students who attend the camp will develop new friends, new ideas, and a new outlook on mathematics.

AARMS COVID-19 Seminar: JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
2020-05-20 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Halifax) | Zoom seminar
Simulating a SARS-CoV-2 model as a branching process
JC Loredo-Osti (MUN)
We will discuss some of the advantages of using branching processes to model an outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 in a small population where other approaches may not be as optimal. We use the NZ Aotearola model as a basis to illustrate how a ‘brute force’ simulation procedure can be easily implemented.
This is a virtual zoom seminar. If you would like to attend, please email the organizers for connection details.

Open quantum systems
2020-02-24 - 2020-03-13 | AIMS Centre of Excellence, Limbe, Cameroon
This course is concerned with the behaviour quantum systems under the influence of external noise. The theory describes generic noise induced features, such as decoherence, entanglement, thermalization. They are of core interest in applications in various branches of science: in quantum information and computation, chemistry, material sciences and even in biology. Basic familiarity with this theory is a good (and necessary) foundation for a more advanced understanding of most modern quantum sciences.
The course will be taught by Marco Merkli (Memorial University) at the African Institute for the Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) Centre of Excellence in Limbe, Cameroon. AARMS support for Atlantic Canadian participation in AIMS graduate courses is an important component of the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the two institutes in 2015.

Combinatorial Algebra meets Algebraic Combinatorics 2020
2020-01-24 - 2020-01-26 | Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Combinatorics Algebra meets Algebraic Combinatorics” (CAAC) is a series of annual workshops that has been meeting since 2004. The main achievement of these meetings is the establishment of an ongoing dialogue between two separate research groups who had previously been using di erent techniques to study similar mathematical problems. The two groups are algebraic combinatorialists working on the representation theory of symmetric groups, and commutative algebraists studying minimal free resolutions and inverse systems. Since the initial meeting, the focus of the conference has broadened to include other areas of overlap. These include, among others: (1) the representation theory of quivers (also known as directed graphs); (2) combinatorial Hopf Algebras, which refers to a Hopf algebraic structure related to (quasi)symmetric functions, permutations, trees, and other combinatorial objects; and (3) edge ideals of graphs and their algebraic invariants.

Mini-course on GAP
2020-01-13 - 2020-01-17 | Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Leandro Vendramin of the University of Buenos Aires will give a
special minicourse from January 13-17. The course will be on the
computer algebra system GAP. It will take place in the Department of
Mathematics and Statistics at Dalhousie, and will also be
live-streamed. It will be suitable for undergraduates, graduate
students, postdocs, faculty, and everyone interested in symbolic
computation.
The first lecture of the minicourse will also work as a colloquium.
Please see below for the precise dates and times.
Monday, January 13: 3:30-5, Chase 319
Tuesday, January 14: 11:30-1, Chase 319
Wednesday, January 15: 12:30-2:30, Chase 227
Thursday, January 16: 11:30-1, Chase 319
Friday, January 17: 12:30-2:30, Chase 227
Speaker: Leandro Vendramin
Title: Algebra with GAP
Abstract: We will give a brief introduction to the software GAP,
designed for calculations related to group theory. The course will be
mainly based on examples, exercises and application problems. We will
discuss several different introductory mathematical topics such as
permutations, matrices, groups, rings, and fields. More advanced
topics such as characters and representation of groups, algebras, and
other algebraic structures, will also be studied. GAP is freely
available at https://www.gap-system.org/
The minicourse is organized by the Atlantic Algebra Centre at Memorial
University and by the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at
Dalhousie University, under the auspices of the AARMS Collaborative
Research Group on “Groups, Rings and Hopf Algebras”.

Discovery Days: Beyond Puzzling
2019-11-27 | Discovery Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
The second installment of AARMS collaboration with the Discovery Centre in Halifax took place on Sunday, November 24. The activities included an enhanced experience of the exhibit “Beyond the Rubik’s cube”; a selection of puzzles to be completed by the visitors; polyhedral nets to construct 3D objects by folding paper; coloring tessellations; a library of books with puzzles and riddles for all ages.

AARMS annual outreach meeting
2019-11-23 | Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

Data Visualization Competition
2019-11-21 | Fredericton, Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada
The objective of the Data Visualization Competition is to highlight the community-wide benefits of open data, including identifying potential improvements to government services and procedures, and recognizing potential business opportunities. The event is designed to help educate and communicate the benefits and growth opportunities from visualization your data.
All levels of government, academia and industry have large amounts of data available to the public through open data portals and this event promotes the use of this resource. Competitors will analyze, interpret, and compile the existing data and present a recommendation or solution on subjects ranging from social, environmental, and economic. The challenge is to convert complex data into an easy to understand presentation and communicate it to the audience.
This event will bring together citizens, students, academics, entrepreneurs, business professionals and members of government throughout providing several networking opportunities to strengthen these connections.

Surface Braid Groups and Mapping Class Groups
2019-11-04 - 2019-11-08 | Memorial University (St. John’s Campus), St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
Mini course by Professor Paolo Bellingeri Université de Caen
Surface braid groups are a natural generalization of classical
braid groups and of fundamental groups of surfaces. They were first
defined by Zariski during the 1930’s (although braid groups on the
sphere had been considered much earlier by Hurwitz), and they were
re-discovered during the 1960’s in the study of mapping class groups and
configuration spaces. These groups, introduced as an “algebraic” tool,
turned out to be very difficult to understand. It is now common to use
mapping class techniques to study the properties of surface braid groups.
In the last decade the interest in these groups grew notably, in
particular due to their relations with knot theory and mapping class
groups and, quite astonishingly, with robotics. The mini course will
start with different definitions and group presentations for these
groups; this first part will allow us to present several combinatorial
properties, such as residual properties, central series, and related
quotients, which will lead to some applications to finite type invariant
theory as well as linear and “symmetric” representations for surface
braid groups. We will then discuss the relation between surface braid
groups and mapping class groups. We will end with an overview on classic
and more recent applications to knot theory in 3-manifolds. Here and
there we will present some open questions.
The lecturer of the mini course, Paolo Bellingeri, is a professor at the
University of Caen and the director of the Federation of Normandy
Laboratories of Mathematics. He also serves as the lead scientist of the
research group “Algèbre Représentations et Topologie pour l’Informatique
Quantique et Classique” (ARTIQ). He has published widely on the topic of
the mini course and is one of the organizers of the conference series
“WinterBraids” on this research area.
