The Fifth Ahlfors-Bers Colloquium (2011)

William Marsh Rice University, Houston TX

Investigators

Abstract

This award will provide support for participants, especially women, graduate students, postdocs, and junior faculty, in the "Fifth Ahlfors-Bers Colloquium (2011)" that will be take place from March 24-27, 2011, on the campus of Rice University. The focus of this conference, like those of its four predecessors in the series, is on the rich mathematical legacy of Lars Ahlfors (1907-1996) and Lipman Bers (1914-1993). Some of the special topics of emphasis for this particular event are the following: Teichmuller theory, with a focus on the Weil-Petersson flow on moduli space; the virtual Haken conjecture for hyperbolic three-manifolds; surface group representations into various targets; Schramm-Loewner evolution and its relation to other areas of geometric function theory (e.g., conformal welding). The format of the meeting is such that young people will have ample opportunities to speak and be otherwise engaged in the various conference activities, especially in the two workshop-like sessions and the problem session that the conference will feature.