Probability and Mathematical Physics Seminar

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Quantum graphs, convex bodies, and a century-year-old problem of Minkowski

Speaker: Yair Shenfeld, Princeton University

Location: Warren Weaver Hall 1302

Date: Friday, October 18, 2019, 11:10 a.m.

Synopsis:

That the ball minimizes surface area among all sets of fixed volume, was known since antiquity; this is equivalent to the fact that the ball is the unique set which yields equality in the isoperimetric inequality. But the isoperimetric inequality is only a very special case of quadratic inequalities about mixed volumes of convex bodies, whose equality cases were unknown since the time of Minkowski. This talk is about these quadratic inequalities and their unusual equality cases which we resolved using degenerate diffusions on the sphere. No prior knowledge of the subject is assumed.

 

Joint work with Ramon van Handel.