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College of Liberal Arts and Sciences University of Florida

1999–2000 Ulam Colloquium:
Gilbert Strang

Partly random graphs and small world networks

Gilbert Strang speaking at the 2000 Ulam Colloquium
Strang at his Ulam colloquium

Speaker: Professor Gilbert Strang, MIT
Date and time: Monday, January 10, 2000, 4:00–5:00 p.m.
Location: Little Hall, Room 109
Introductory remarks: Provost David Colburn
Cookies and coffee: 3:30 p.m., Little Hall, Room 339 (the Atrium)

Abstract

It is almost true that any two people in the US are connected by less than six steps from one friend to another. What are models for large graphs with such small diameters? Watts and Strogatz observed (in Nature, June 1998) that a few random edges in a graph could quickly reduce its diameter (longest distance between two nodes). We report on an analysis by Newman and Watts (using mathematics of physicists) to estimate the diameter with an N-cycle and M random shortcuts, \(1ll Mll N\).

About the speaker

Gilbert Strang was an undergraduate at MIT and a Rhodes Scholar at Balliol College, Oxford. His Ph.D was from UCLA and since then he has taught at MIT. He has been a Sloan Fellow and a Fairchild Scholar and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His is a Professor of Mathematics at MIT and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College.

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