Coherent Structures in Evolutionary Equations

By Margaret Beck
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July 12-16, 2010
Lorentz Center, Leiden,
the Netherlands
A picturesque Dutch windmill, as seen from the workshop boatride.
Marco Romito, along with organizers Jens Rademacher and Greg Pavliotis.
Roughly 40 mathematicians gathered at the Lorentz Center in Leiden from July 12-16, 2010, for a workshop entitled "Coherent Structures in Evolutionary Equations." Organized by Greg Pavliotis and Jens Rademacher, the workshop was focused on bringing together researchers from various sub-fields within partial differential equations and dynamical systems whose work involves pattern formation and evolutionary PDEs in one form or another. In particular, the workshop was a great success at bringing together those who work on both deterministic and stochastic equations to share ideas and perspectives on a variety of problems.
After recovering from the World Cup final the night before, the workshop began on Monday with tutorials on the Ginzburg-Landau equation and non-uniqueness issues in S(P)DEs. The day concluded with a wine and cheese reception and, for at least some participants, a bike ride to a local bar using the convenient Lorentz Center rental bikes. The workshop continued with a diverse and interesting program, including topics such as space-time chaos, metastability - from both a deterministic and stochastic point of view, and solitons. Because of the relatively small number of participants, the organizers were able to schedule only one talk at a time (no difficult choices to make between simultaneous sessions!) and also include a nontrivial amount of time for focus group discussions and other collaboration. Wednesday night we were treated to a conference dinner and boat ride through some local canals and lakes.

[Aside: I learned that, according to some, the technical terms are not "stochastic" and "deterministic," but rather "stochastic" and "non-stochastic." I believe this is what passes in the stochastics community for a joke.]


Participants Johannes Zimmer, Karsten
Matthies, Michael Herrmann, and
Hannes Uecker hard at work.


Personally, I came away from the workshop with a sense that there really had been some meaningful interactions between people who typically don't attend the same conferences (at least not ones small enough where you actually meet new people). I highly encourage interested parties to organize small workshops that feature such diverse programs. Also, I strongly recommend visiting the Lorentz Center if you get the opportunity. The staff do an excellent job of providing an environment conducive to mathematics!
Marco Romito, Martin Hairer, and Dirk Blömker in the Lorenz Center common room.
Part of the upper deck during the conference dinner and boatride.
Acknowledgements: Thanks to the organizers, Jens and Greg! Also thanks to Daniel Sutton and Wael Mohammed for providing the photographs. This article was written by Margaret Beck. Any findings, conclusions, opinions, or recommendations are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of any other participant in the workshop.
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