Search results for ""Author Shing Tung Yau""

'A must-read.”―Avi Loeb, New York Times–bestselling author of Extraterrestrial One of the preeminent mathematicians of the past half century shows how physics and math were combined to give us the theory of gravity and the dizzying array of ideas and insights that has come from it  Mathematics is far more than just the language of science. It is a critical underpinning of nature. The famed physicist Albert Einstein demonstrated this in 1915 when he showed that gravity—long considered an attractive force between massive objects—was actually a manifestation of the curvature, or geometry, of space and time. But in making this towering intellectual leap, Einstein needed the help of several mathematicians, including Marcel Grossmann, who introduced him to the geometrical framework upon which his theory rest.   In The Gravity of Math, Steve Nadis and Shing-Tung Yau consider how math can dr

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This collection of papers constitutes a wide-ranging survey of recent developments in differential geometry and its interactions with other fields, especially partial differential equations and mathematical physics. This area of mathematics was the subject of a special program at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton during the academic year 1979-1980; the papers in this volume were contributed by the speakers in the sequence of seminars organized by Shing-Tung Yau for this program. Both survey articles and articles presenting new results are included. The articles on differential geometry and partial differential equations include a general survey article by the editor on the relationship of the two fields and more specialized articles on topics including harmonic mappings, isoperimetric and Poincare inequalities, metrics with specified curvature properties, the Monge-Arnpere equation, L2 harmonic forms and cohomology, manifolds of positive curvature, isometric embedding, and Kraumlhler manifolds and metrics. The articles on differential geometry and mathematical physics cover such topics as renormalization, instantons, gauge fields and the Yang-Mills equation, nonlinear evolution equations, incompleteness of space-times, black holes, and quantum gravity. A feature of special interest is the inclusion of a list of more than one hundred unsolved research problems compiled by the editor with comments and bibliographical information.

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A Fields medalist recounts his lifelong transnational effort to uncover the geometric shape—the Calabi-Yau manifold—that may store the hidden dimensions of our universe. “An unexpectedly intimate look into a highly accomplished man, his colleagues and friends, the development of a new field of geometric analysis, and a glimpse into a truly uncommon mind.”—Nina MacLaughlin, Boston Globe“Engaging, eminently readable . . . For those with a taste for elegant and largely jargon-free explanations of mathematics, The Shape of a Life promises hours of rewarding reading.”—Judith Goodstein, American Scientist Harvard geometer and Fields medalist Shing-Tung Yau has provided a mathematical foundation for string theory, offered new insights into black holes, and mathematically demonstrated the stability of our universe. In this autobiography, Yau reflects on his improbable journey to becoming one of the world’s most distinguished mathematicians. Beginning with an impoverished childhood in China and Hong Kong, Yau takes readers through his doctoral studies at Berkeley during the height of the Vietnam War protests, his Fields Medal–winning proof of the Calabi conjecture, his return to China, and his pioneering work in geometric analysis. This new branch of geometry, which Yau built up with his friends and colleagues, has paved the way for solutions to several important and previously intransigent problems. With complicated ideas explained for a broad audience, this book offers readers not only insights into the life of an eminent mathematician, but also an accessible way to understand advanced and highly abstract concepts in mathematics and theoretical physics.

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The uniformization theorem of Riemann surfaces is one of the most beautiful and important theorems in mathematics. Besides giving a clean classification of Riemann surfaces, its proof has motivated many new methods, such as the Riemann–Hilbert correspondence, Picard–Fuchs equations, and higher-dimensional generalizations of the uniformization theorem, which include Calabi–Yau manifolds.This volume consists of expository papers on the four topics in its title, written by experts from around the world, and is the first to put forth a comprehensive discussion of these topics, and of the relations between them. As such, it is valuable as an introduction for beginners, and as a reference for mathematicians in general.

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In the twentieth century, American mathematicians began to make critical advances in a field previously dominated by Europeans. Harvard’s mathematics department was at the center of these developments. A History in Sum is an inviting account of the pioneers who trailblazed a distinctly American tradition of mathematics—in algebraic geometry and topology, complex analysis, number theory, and a host of esoteric subdisciplines that have rarely been written about outside of journal articles or advanced textbooks. The heady mathematical concepts that emerged, and the men and women who shaped them, are described here in lively, accessible prose.The story begins in 1825, when a precocious sixteen-year-old freshman, Benjamin Peirce, arrived at the College. He would become the first American to produce original mathematics—an ambition frowned upon in an era when professors largely limited themselves to teaching. Peirce’s successors—William Fogg Osgood and Maxime Bôcher—undertook the task of transforming the math department into a world-class research center, attracting to the faculty such luminaries as George David Birkhoff. Birkhoff produced a dazzling body of work, while training a generation of innovators—students like Marston Morse and Hassler Whitney, who forged novel pathways in topology and other areas. Influential figures from around the world soon flocked to Harvard, some overcoming great challenges to pursue their elected calling.A History in Sum elucidates the contributions of these extraordinary minds and makes clear why the history of the Harvard mathematics department is an essential part of the history of mathematics in America and beyond.

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This work presents lectures from the important String Theory International Conference held in 2002 in Hangzhou, China. These include talks given by several mathematicians of particular prominence in the field, among them Stephen Hawking and Edward Witten. Interest in string theory is driven largely by the hope that it will evolve to be the ultimate 'Theory of Everything'. Work on string theory has led to advances in many branches of mathematics. This rapidly developing subject is one of the mainstream topics of mathematics in the 21st century. The current volume presents lectures from the important String Theory International Conference held in 2002 in Hangzhou, China. These include talks given by several mathematicians of particular prominence in the field, among them Stephen Hawking and Edward Witten.

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In algebraic geometry and theoretical physics, mirror symmetry refers to the relationship between two Calabi–Yau manifolds which appear very different geometrically but are nevertheless equivalent when employed as extra dimensions of string theory.Mathematicians became interested in mirror symmetry around 1990, when it was shown that mirror symmetry could be used to count rational curves on a Calabi–Yau manifold, thus solving a long-standing problem.Today, mirror symmetry is a fundamental tool for doing calculations in string theory, and it has been used to understand aspects of quantum field theory, the formalism that physicists use to describe elementary particles. Major approaches to mirror symmetry include the homological mirror symmetry program of Maxim Kontsevich and the SYZ conjecture of Andrew Strominger, Shing-Tung Yau, and Eric Zaslow.This handbook surveys recent developments in mirror symmetry. It presents papers based on selected lectures given at a 2014 Taipei conference on “Calabi–Yau Geometry and Mirror Symmetry,” along with other contributions from invited authors.

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