Wednesday, May 09, 2007
4:15 PM -
5:15 PM
Thomas Wolff Memorial Lecture in Mathematics: Topics in Additive Combinatorics
Freiman's Theorem
Ben Green,
Herchel Smith Professor of Pure Mathematics,
University of Cambridge,
Speaker's Bio:
Ben Green was recognized for his joint work with Terry Tao on arithmetic progressions of prime numbers. These are equally spaced sequences of primes such as 31, 37, 43 or 13, 43, 73, 103. Results in the area go back to the work of Lagrange and Waring in the 1770's. A major breakthrough came in 1939 when the Dutch mathematician Johannes van der Corput showed that there are an infinite number of three-term arithmetic progressions of primes. Green and Tao showed that for any n, there are infinitely many n-term progressions of primes. Their proof, which relies on results of Szemerédi (1975) and Goldston and Yildirim (2003), uses ideas from combinatorics, ergodic theory, and the theory of pseudorandom numbers. The Green-Tao result is a major advance in our understanding of the primes.<br><br> Green was born in 1977 in Bristol, England. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge first as an undergraduate and later as a research student of Fields Medalist Tim Gowers. Since 2001 he has been a Fellow of Trinity College, and in that time he has visited Princeton, the Renyi Institute in Budapest and University of British Columbia, Vancouver, for extended periods. Green held a chair in Pure Mathematics at Bristol University from January 2005 until his return to Cambridge in September 2006.<br><br> Green will hold an appointment as a Clay Research Fellow from July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2007.
Ben Green was recognized for his joint work with Terry Tao on arithmetic progressions of prime numbers. These are equally spaced sequences of primes such as 31, 37, 43 or 13, 43, 73, 103. Results in the area go back to the work of Lagrange and Waring in the 1770's. A major breakthrough came in 1939 when the Dutch mathematician Johannes van der Corput showed that there are an infinite number of three-term arithmetic progressions of primes. Green and Tao showed that for any n, there are infinitely many n-term progressions of primes. Their proof, which relies on results of Szemerédi (1975) and Goldston and Yildirim (2003), uses ideas from combinatorics, ergodic theory, and the theory of pseudorandom numbers. The Green-Tao result is a major advance in our understanding of the primes.<br><br> Green was born in 1977 in Bristol, England. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge first as an undergraduate and later as a research student of Fields Medalist Tim Gowers. Since 2001 he has been a Fellow of Trinity College, and in that time he has visited Princeton, the Renyi Institute in Budapest and University of British Columbia, Vancouver, for extended periods. Green held a chair in Pure Mathematics at Bristol University from January 2005 until his return to Cambridge in September 2006.<br><br> Green will hold an appointment as a Clay Research Fellow from July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2007.
"Freiman's Theorem," Ben Green, Herchel Smith Professor of Pure Mathematics, University of Cambridge. (The lecture will be accessible to a general mathematical audience.)
Event Sponsors:
For more information, please contact Stacey V. Croomes by phone at 626-395-4336 or by email at [email protected] or visit http://math.caltech.edu/events/wolff07.html.