Colloquium in honor of Prof. Dr. Hans-Christoph Grunau's 65th birthday

Prof. Dr. Anna Dall'Acqua

Title: Unwinding an elastic wire

How does a thin elastic rod choose its shape? A natural way to model this is to assign an energy that measures how much the rod bends, and to look for shapes that minimize this energy. We begin by exploring these optimal configurations. We then ask what happens if the rod is allowed to move: how does its shape evolve if it continuously tries to reduce its bending? We discuss general ideas that ensure this evolution is well-defined and eventually settles into an equilibrium.

Finally, we show how this one-dimensional picture sheds light on the behavior of certain surfaces, revealing an unexpected connection between the motion of curves and geometric evolution in higher dimensions.

Prof. Dr. Guido Sweers

Title: Bending clamped plates

Pulling a string or pushing a membrane fixed at the boundary results in the string/membrane to move in the same direction. More than 100 years ago one expected to same to hold for a plate fixed at it boundary. It turned out to be not that obvious or even true in general. The first models lead to boundary value problems with second order (elliptic) differential equations, while the plate leads us to a fourth order elliptic problem. For the general audience I hope to explain the concepts, some known results and two open problems including clues what to expect. 

Prof. Dr. Filippo Gazzola

Title: Daily mathematics in fluid-structure interactions

Daily life is full of phenomena related to fluid-structure interactions that we often fail to recognize.

Mathematics, the natural sciences, physics, and engineering are not always able to explain what we observe.

Sometimes, different theories lead to conflicting conclusions.

The purpose of my talk is to uncover these interactions, to connect some seemingly different phenomena, and to raise unanswered questions.

I will also discuss some personal contributions.

No specific knowledge is required, just a strong sense of observation, coupled with curiosity and a thirst for knowledge.