RTG: Math 699
Current Topics in Topology


Meeting time and place: Fridays from 3:30pm-5pm in Herman Brown 427
Instructors: Tim Cochran and Shelly Harvey

    Current Participants (listed in alphabetic order):

    Faculty:
      Tim Cochran
      Shelly Harvey
      Andy Putman

    Postdocs:
      Eamonn Tweedy
      Allison Moore
      Ina Petkova

    Graduate Students:
      Anthony Bosman
      Corey Bregman
      David Cohen
      James Cooper
      Kenan Ince
      Miriam Kuzbary
      Jung Hwan Park
      Arunima Ray
      Katherine Vance
      Diego Vela
*Is on a Monday

Spring 2014

DateSpeakerTopic
1-24Ice Storm - no seminar
1-31Diego VelaThe Adjunction Inequality
2-7Miriam KuzbaryAn Introduction to Khovanov Homology
2-14Aru RayAn introduction to the concordance invariant epsilon from Knot Floer homology.
2-21Katherine Poulsen"Grid diagrams, braids, and contact geometry" by L. Ng and D. Thurston
2-28David CohenLie algebra cohomology
3-7Spring Break - no seminar
3-14Corey BregmanBaumslag-Solitar Group Theory and Baumslag-Solitar Geometry
3-21James CooperCasson's invariant for homology 3-spheres
3-28Jung Hwan Park
4-4Spring Recess - no seminar
4-11Ina Petkova
4-14*Anthony Bosman
4-25Kenan Ince

Fall 2013

DateSpeakerTopic
9-13David CohenThe cohomology of Thompson's group F
9-20Diego VelaAlexander Polynomials of Equivariant Slice and Equivariant Ribbokn knots in S^3
9-27Aru RayAkbulut's corks and exotic smooth structures on 4-manifolds
10-4Eamonn TweedyQuasi-alternating links and knot homologies
10-11Miriam KuzbaryBranched covers and fibered links
10-18Allison MooreTopology and Data Analysis
10-25Corey BregmanFlat vector bundles and the Milnor-Wood inequality
11-1Katherine VanceCobordism, homotopy and homology of graphs in R3
11-8James Cooper"Stable commutator length on mapping class groups" by Bestvina, Bromberg, and Fujiwara
11-15Jung Hwan Park"On simply-connected 4-manifolds" by C.T.C. Wall
11-22Anthony BosmanRochlin's Invariant for spin 3-manifolds
11-29No seminar - Thanksgiving

Previous Years:

Fall 2011 - Summer 2012
Fall 2011 - Summer 2012
Fall 2010 - Summer 2011
Fall 2009 - Summer 2010
Fall 2008 - Summer 2009
Please send all comments to Shelly Harvey (svhvevlvlvyvvvvv at rice dot edu, take out the v's)