Loss of compactness in nonlinear PDE: Recent trends (07w5087)

Organizers

(Università di Roma Tre)

Frank Pacard (Ecole Polytechnique)

Gabriella Tarantello (Roma Tor Vergata)

Description

The Banff International Research Station in the Banff Centre will host a conference in nonlinear analysis this week August 26-31, 2007, bringing together some of the most talented mathematics researchers and experts in the field. The conference will give the members of a large scientific community, diffused all over the world, the opportunity to meet, discuss and interact. The participants come from North and South America, Europe and Asia. The event is organized by some worldwide reputed mathematicians in the field: Pierpaolo Esposito (University of British Columbia and of "Roma Tre"), Frank Pacard (University of Paris XII-Val de Marne), and Gabriella Tarantello (University of Roma "Tor Vergata").

The conference will focus on recent developments in a meaningful, active and rich research area in the study of partial differential equations. Physical phenomena can be modelled by equations involving several physical unknown quantities (depending on the model). A better understanding of these equations naturally leads to new insights in the physical models. Since the work of Ginzburg and Landau, several theories have been proposed to describe superconductivity, and other interesting models arise also in the study of biological dynamics, thermionic emission, star’s evolution, gas combustion, statistical mechanics, only to quote a few. Surprisingly, similarly qualitative problems arise also in differential geometry, where the study of differential properties for surfaces dates back to Gauss. The rigorous analysis of such models leads to an existence theory and to many qualitative properties, whose profound consequences are relevant to physics, biology and geometry.

The Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Innovation and Discovery (BIRS) is a collaborative Canada-US-Mexico venture that provides an environment for creative interaction as well as the exchange of ideas, knowledge, and methods within the mathematical sciences, with related disciplines and with industry. The research station is located at the Banff Centre in Alberta and is supported by Canada's Natural Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the US National Science Foundation (NSF), Alberta's Advanced Education and Technology and Mexico's Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACYT).