Speaker: Dr. Jon McCammond, University of California, Santa Barbara
Title: “Complex polynomials, braided strings and non-crossing partitions”

Abstract: One of the fascinating things about advanced mathematics is how areas that seem to be far apart end up being closely related.  Consider, for example, the "space" of all complex polynomials of a fixed degree restricted to those with distinct roots. There is a classic way to view this as a complement of a union of hyperplanes in a high-dimensional complex vector space, and the loops in this space can be visualized by braided strings in our normal 3-dimensional space. There is also a more recent connection to the combinatorial objects known as non-crossing partitions. This talk is based on joint work with Michael Dougherty.

Join us before the talk at 2:00 pm for tea with our speaker.

The KSU Mathematics Colloquium is a seminar series that brings in researchers from other universities to present results on all areas of Mathematics. The talks are targeted at general audiences of students and professors.