Geometry motivated by physics
Math Sciences 6627, 1:00 p.m.
Thursday and Friday: May 1& 2, 2003

Slides from the talk

Abstract:
In the past thirty years, differential geometry has received a lot of impact from ideas of physics, particularly from general relativity, gauge theory and string theory. Professor Yau will talk about some of these developments, both past and current. Some open questions may be discussed.

Background:
Shing-Tung Yau is universally regarded as the greatest differential geometer of his generation. His profound work has impacted such diverse fields as topology, algebraic geometry, general relativity, and string theory.

Yau was born in China in 1949. In 1982, he was awarded the Fields medal for his contributions to partial differential equations, to the Calabi conjecture in algebraic geometry, to the positive mass conjecture of general relativity, and to real and complex Monge-Ampere equations. In 1997, he was awarded the National Medal of Science, the highest scientific honor in the US. He has won numerous awards and honors and is a member of several scientific academies. He is currently at Harvard.