Talks

Translational tiling is a covering of a space (e.g., Euclidean space) using translated copies of a building block, called a "tile'', without any positive measure overlaps. What are the possible ways that a space can be tiled? One of the most well known conjectures in this area is the periodic tiling conjecture. It asserts that any tile of Euclidean space can tile the space periodically. This conjecture was posed 35 years ago and has been intensively studied over the years. In a joint work with Terence Tao, we disprove the periodic tiling conjecture in high dimensions. In the talk, I will motivate this result and discuss our proof.

Conformal Regge theory predicts the existence of analytically continued CFT data for complex spin. How could this work when there are so many more local operators with large spin compared to small spin? Using planar N=4 SYM as a testground we find a simple physical picture. Local operators do organize themselves into analytic families but the continuation of the higher families have zeroes in their structure OPE constants for lower integer spins. They thus decouple. Newton's interpolation series technique is perfectly suited to this physical problem and will allow us to explore the right complex spin half-plane.

 

Gravitational waves with frequencies below 1 nHz are notoriously difficult to detect. With periods exceeding current experimental lifetimes, they induce slow drifts in observables rather than periodic correlations. Observables with well-known intrinsic contributions provide a means to probe this regime. In this talk, I will demonstrate the viability of using observed pulsar timing parameters to discover such ultralow frequency gravitational waves, presenting two complementary observables for which the systematic shift induced by ultralow-frequency gravitational waves can be extracted. I will then show the results of searches for both continuous and stochastic signals from supermassive black hole binaries using existing data for these observables, and demonstrate that this technique has the power to probe astrophysically-interesting strains.

Zoom Link:  https://pitp.zoom.us/j/95734210379?pwd=Wnp1cHR2QW93bksxaGlCWEZVSjRsUT09

No-go theorems (Bell, Kochen-Specker, …) formally show the departure of quantum theory from classical theory. These are formulated in the framework of ontological models and, if one accepts such framework, entail that quantum theory involves problematic (“fine-tuned”) properties. I will argue that the lesson to take from the no-go theorems is to abandon the framework of ontological models as the way to model reality. I will analyze what I believe to be the unnatural assumptions of such framework and I will propose a way to change it. The basic principle of the new notion of reality I propose is that for something to exist is for something to be recorded. I will motivate the principle and explore its consequences. In order to implement such proposal into a precise theory-independent mathematical framework I will make use of point-free topological spaces (locales). I will discuss why this new proposal should be promising for understanding quantum theory and I will present several open questions.

Zoom link:  https://pitp.zoom.us/j/91292006884?pwd=V2EzaEw5Z3NRUGd4cVdSRnlOOWFVZz09

These lectures will cover the concepts and techniques of effective field theory. I will try to introduce several of the useful techniques which do not usually get covered in the standard QFT courses and books. We will start with the effective field theory aspects of QED, and end with the treatment of general relativity as a quantum field theory using effective field theory techniques.