EVENT DETAILS AND ABSTRACT

Title: The insulated conductivity problem
Speaker: Ben Weinkove
Speaker Info: Northwestern
Brief Description:
Special Note:
Abstract:

The insulated conductivity problem concerns optimal gradient bounds for harmonic functions with Neumann boundary conditions. A particular case of interest is when the boundary is a union of spheres which approach each other. Physically this represents two spherical insulators which are almost touching, and the question is to find optimal bounds for the magnitude of the electric field between them. Although the problem is simple to state, it is is surprisingly difficult. It was recently resolved by Dong-Li-Yang. I will give an exposition of this problem and their resolution.