Mathematics Colloquia and Seminars

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Wolfgang Haken was the first to present the unknotting problem in a discrete setting. In this talk we'll cover how we turn this topological problem into a combinatorial one by constructing the Haken Normal Cone. Once we've gone over the basics, we'll see ties to the Hilbert basis, and how techniques and advances in vertex enumeration of polytopes has given better and better upper bounds on the computational complexity of this problem.