Math Monday, MSRI Trip, Movie Night, and more

[Berkeley MUSA]

Hello,

Welcome back from spring break! I hope you all were able to relax and are ready to face the crushing stress of the coming weeks. We'll be adding some Facebook hyperlinks to the events so you can add them to your calendars easily. Here are this week's announcements:

Math Monday: Monday, April 2, 5pm (939 Evans)
Title: Soap film solutions to Plateau's problem

Speaker: Jenny Harrison

Abstract: Plateau’s problem asks if there is an area minimizing surface spanning a given boundary curve. Roughly speaking, the competing surfaces must contain the curve and not have any holes. Is there an area minimizer amongst the class of all such surfaces? Jesse Douglas was awarded one of the first Fields medals in 1936 for his solution of Plateau’s problem. Federer and Fleming were awarded the Steele Prize for their 1960 solution. Reifenberg produced a completely different solution, also in 1960. We will briefly discuss how these papers were independent of each other and solved special distinct cases. Most mathematicians believe this was the end of the story. But was there anything significant left to do? We will answer this question in the affirmative and describe some recent results arising from a flurry of interest in the last four years. 

Prerequisites: The talk should be accessible to students who have studied real analysis (104), although some simple algebraic topology will be invoked to say what it means for a surface to span a given boundary.

MSRI Trip: Thursday, April 5, 2:00pm (Evans Hall Main Entrance)

As announced earlier, we'll be having our trip to the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute this Thursday afternoon. To get there, we'll be taking the Hill Shuttle. The bus leaves Evans Hall at 2:10pm, so be there at least ten minutes before. We'll be meeting in front of the main entrance to the first floor of Evans Hall (the entrance that also leads to the Math & Stats Library, on the East side of the building facing Hearst Mining Circle). If you're lost, look for Sanat.

Movie Night: Thursday, April 5, 7pm (1015 Evans)

We'll be showing The Theory of Everything, a 2014 film about the life of Stephen Hawking. From HBO: "The story of British physicist Stephen Hawking and his wife Jane is told in this intimate, moving film. Beginning with their meet-cute in Cambridge in 1963, the film tracks their relationship across the years as Stephen suffers from the debilitating effects of ALS even as his incredible brilliance brings him to the worldwide prominence. Starring Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones." Snacks will be provided, and the film is 2hr 5min runtime. Note the later start time from our usual start time of 6pm.

Summer School on Differential Geometry:

A summer school on Differential Geometry aimed at undergraduate students sponsored 

by the Gulbenkian Foundation will take place in Lisbon from July 23 to July 27. It will consist of three 5 hour 

courses by Robert Bryant, Danny Calegari and André Neves. 

Participants are only required to be familiar with linear algebra and multi-variable calculus. 

More information can be found here.

The Gulbenkian Foundation will provide a limited number of 500 euro grants to support the travel and 

accommodation expenses of foreign participants. The webpage above contains instructions on how to 

apply for funding. The deadline is May 15th.

Jane Street Digital Info Sessions - Infrastructure Rotational Program:

Hey, you might've noticed but we're sponsored by Jane Street! What is Jane Street, you ask? Well, Jane Street is a quantitative trading firm with a unique focus on technology and collaborative problem solving. With offices in three of the world’s most dynamic cities: New York, London and Hong Kong, we operate around the clock and around the globe. Our culture is casual, our careers are intensely rewarding and we are always looking for great new people to join our talented team.

This April we’re hosting digital info sessions about Jane Street and providing a closer look at our Infrastructure Rotational Program. See the attached job description for more info about what the program is. We're currently hiring students that can start immediately (recent alumni or graduating seniors), but would also be happy to have current juniors attend if they're looking ahead to full time opportunities for next year. Please note that these info sessions are not intended for students looking for internships for this summer. Our info sessions are hosted by real people and they are interactive and informative. Sessions run about 1 hour depending on Q&A.

We hope you can join us. Go here to register.

Other Opportunities: See attached.