Mathematics Colloquia and Seminars

Return to Colloquia & Seminar listing

The past quarter century has seen the emergence of many powerful algebraic invariants of knots, links, and surfaces in 3- and 4-dimensional manifolds. These homology-type invariants, including categorified quantum invariants such as Khovanov homology, are able to simultaneously capture much information about their associated topological objects while also being amenable to algebraic, homotopical, or combinatorial techniques. In this talk, I will discuss recent developments where algebraic structure yields topological answers as well as new connections between topology and other areas of mathematics.

Refreshments will be served before the talk.