Combinatorics Reading Group

University of Birmingham, Spring 2016

  • Mondays, 4pm in Muirhead 121
  • Contact Will Perkins with any questions.
  • The two themes of this term's reading group are convex optimization and linear algebraic methods in combinatorics.
  • Goals of the reading group include learning tools that may be valuable in your research; learning about new areas and new problems; and practicing giving good mathematical talks.
  • Fall 2015 reading group

Schedule

January 11. (from last term's topic) Correlation decay and a FPTAS for counting matchings in bounded degree graphs. Simple deterministic approximation algorithms for counting matchings , Bayati, Gamarnik, Katz, Nair, Tetali. Amelia Taylor.
January 25. Linear programming and duality. Will Perkins.
February 1. Semidefinite programming. Wei En Tan.
February 8. LP/SDP relaxations and approximation algorithms. Amelia Taylor.
February 15. The Lovasz Theta Function. Frederik Garbe.
February 22. Applications of the Theta function to packing problems. Stefan Glock.
February 29. Introduction to discrete Fourier analysis. Nicolás Sanhueza-Matamala.
March 7. Roth's Theorem. Robert Hancock.
March 14. Hoffman's Bound. Tassio Naia Dos Santos.
March 21. Triangle Intersecting Families. Felix Joos.
March 28(?). tba. Jie Han.