Conference: Topological methods in group theory, June 16-20, 2014

Ohio State University, The, Columbus OH

Investigators

Abstract

"Topological Methods in Group Theory" is a conference to be held at Ohio State University, during the week of June 16th-20th, 2014. Group theory is an area of mathematics that was developed in the early 1800's. It provides the appropriate language for studying the collection of symmetries of an object, and is central to much of modern day mathematics. The central player in this theory is an algebraic structure called a group. In the early 1980's, the Russian geometer Misha Gromov realized that one could apply geometric techniques to study these algebraic structures. This remarkable insight led to the development of a new field - geometric group theory. This field is extremely active, with a lot of mathematicians both in the US and abroad. The conference is intended to bring together experts in the field to discuss the latest developments in the area. The conference will feature a large number of plenary talks, both from well-established leaders in the field, as well as from promising young researchers. Some of the topics that will be featured include:(i) groups of finite asymptotic dimension, (ii) amenability of groups,(iii) special cube complexes and applications, (iv)finiteness properties of groups, (v) Thompson's group and analogues, (vi) Coxeter and Artin groups, (vii) L^2-cohomology techniques, (viii) Cannon-Thurston style maps and applications. In addition to the plenary talks, we plan on having shorter (20mn) talks run in parallel sessions, giving younger mathematicians and graduate students the opportunity to broadly disseminate their results. For more information, please check https://people.math.osu.edu/lafont.1/TopMethodsConf.html