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College of Liberal Arts and Sciences University of Florida

2001–2002 Erdős Colloquium:
Sergei Novikov

Topological phenomena in metals

Sergei Novikov

Speaker: Fields Medal Winner and Member of the National Academy of Sciences Sergei Novikov, Professor at Moscow University and the University of Maryland
Date and time: Friday, April 12, 2002, 4:00–5:00 p.m.
Location: Little Hall, Room 101
Introductory remarks: fellow Fields Medalist John G. Thompson, Graduate Research Professor at the University of Florida
Reception: After the lecture, Little Hall, Room 339

Abstract

Highly nontrivial dynamical systems on the Fermi surfaces appear describing motion of electrons in the single crystal normal metals in the magnetic field. If the magnetic field is strong enough, this system determines everything. Important for the electrical conductivity, it leads to the nontrivial problems of topology whose solution permitted to reveal several new integer-valued observable quantities describing behavior of the conductivity tensor.

About the speaker

Sergei Novikov is a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences U.S., member of Academia Europea, member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (Vatican). It was in 1970 that he was awarded the Fields Medal of the International Mathematical Union. Novikov has made fundamental contributions to topology and his work since 1971 has built a bridge between modern mathematics and theoretical physics. Novikov’s main areas of current scientific interest are Geometry, Topology and Mathematical Physics.