RIT Liquid Crystals and Biomembranes

Focus of the RIT in Spring 2005

Study of phase models and analysis of liquid crystals and biomembranes, especially those for which orientational order may be relevant.

Meeting schedule in Spring 2005

The RIT meets on Wednesday from 12pm-1pm PM in MATH 1311.
February 2: Remarks on Baumgart's work. Cory Poole
February 9: Review of literature and notions of curvatures. Sebastian Pauletti
February 9: Review of basic differential geometry: notions of curvature. Sebastian Pauletti
February 16: Review of literature and notions of curvatures. Sebastian Pauletti
February 23: Why do experimentalists need mathematical models? Wolfgang Loser and Ben Shapiro
March 2: Seifert's review article: Curvature models I. Sebastian Pauletti
March 9: Seifert's review article: Curvature models II. Sebastian Pauletti
March 16: Derivation of the Willmore flow I. Sebastian Pauletti
March 30: Covariant differentiation. Sören Bartels
April 6: Derivation of the Willmore flow II.
April 13: Derivation of the Willmore flow III.
April 20: Experiments with vesicles. Wolfgang Losert
May 3: Derivation of the Willmore functional as a plate theory. Ben Shapiro and Jacob King
May 11: A finite element implementation of the mean curvature flow. Sören Bartels
May 11: The work of Subra Suresh at MIT. Cory Poole
May 20: An implementation as an obstacle problem. Sören Bartels

Participants in Spring 2005

Faculty: Georg Dolzmann (Mathematics), Wolfgang Losert (Physics, IPST, IREAP), Ricardo Nochetto (Mathematics), Ben Shapiro (Engineering),

Postdocs: Sören Bartels (Mathematics, UMD and Humboldt University Berlin),

Graduate students: Miguel Pauletti (Mathematics), Cory Poole (Physics), Shawn Walker (Engineering),

Graduate prerequisites

Basic knowledge of continuum mechanics and differential geometry, and a first course in partial differential equations (such as MATH 673).