Refractors in anisotropic media associated with norms

We show existence of interfaces between two anisotropic materials so that light is refracted in accordance with a given pattern of energy. To do this we formulate a vector Snell law for anisotropic media when the wave fronts are given by norms for which the corresponding unit spheres are strictly convex.Comment: 26 pages, 2 figure

Extremal Problems in Minkowski Space related to Minimal Networks

We solve the following problem of Z. F\"uredi, J. C. Lagarias and F. Morgan [FLM]: Is there an upper bound polynomial in $n$ for the largest cardinality of a set S of unit vectors in an n-dimensional Minkowski space (or Banach space) such that the sum of any subset has norm less than 1? We prove that |S|\leq 2n and that equality holds iff the space is linearly isometric to \ell^n_\infty, the space with an n-cube as unit ball. We also remark on similar questions raised in [FLM] that arose out of the study of singularities in length-minimizing networks in Minkowski spaces.Comment: 6 pages. 11-year old paper. Implicit question in the last sentence has been answered in Discrete & Computational Geometry 21 (1999) 437-44

Parametric polynomial minimal surfaces of arbitrary degree

Weierstrass representation is a classical parameterization of minimal surfaces. However, two functions should be specified to construct the parametric form in Weierestrass representation. In this paper, we propose an explicit parametric form for a class of parametric polynomial minimal surfaces of arbitrary degree. It includes the classical Enneper surface for cubic case. The proposed minimal surfaces also have some interesting properties such as symmetry, containing straight lines and self-intersections. According to the shape properties, the proposed minimal surface can be classified into four categories with respect to $n=4k-1$ $n=4k+1$, $n=4k$ and $n=4k+2$. The explicit parametric form of corresponding conjugate minimal surfaces is given and the isometric deformation is also implemented

Uniqueness of planar tangent maps in the modified Ericksen model

We prove the uniqueness of homogeneous blow-up limits of maps minimizing the modified Ericksen energy for nematic liquid crystals in a planar domain. The proof is based on the Weiss monotonicity formula, and a blow-up argument, originally due to Allard and Almgren \cite{AA} for minimal surfaces, and L. Simon \cite{SL} for energy-minimizing maps into analytic targets, which exploits the integrability of certain Jacobi fields.Comment: 17 page

Should we solve Plateau's problem again?

After a short description of various classical solutions of Plateau's problem, we discuss other ways to model soap films, and some of the related questions that are left open. A little more attention is payed to a more specific model, with deformations and sliding boundary conditions.Comment: Lecture for the conference in Honor of E. Stein, 201

Machine Learning, Quantum Mechanics, and Chemical Compound Space

We review recent studies dealing with the generation of machine learning models of molecular and solid properties. The models are trained and validated using standard quantum chemistry results obtained for organic molecules and materials selected from chemical space at random

Optimal boundary control of a simplified Ericksen--Leslie system for nematic liquid crystal flows in 2D2D

In this paper, we investigate an optimal boundary control problem for a two dimensional simplified Ericksen--Leslie system modelling the incompressible nematic liquid crystal flows. The hydrodynamic system consists of the Navier--Stokes equations for the fluid velocity coupled with a convective Ginzburg--Landau type equation for the averaged molecular orientation. The fluid velocity is assumed to satisfy a no-slip boundary condition, while the molecular orientation is subject to a time-dependent Dirichlet boundary condition that corresponds to the strong anchoring condition for liquid crystals. We first establish the existence of optimal boundary controls. Then we show that the control-to-state operator is Fr\'echet differentiable between appropriate Banach spaces and derive first-order necessary optimality conditions in terms of a variational inequality involving the adjoint state variables

Partielle Differentialgleichungen

The workshop dealt with partial differential equations in geometry and technical applications. The main topics were the combination of nonlinear partial differential equations and geometric problems, regularity of free boundaries, conformal invariance and the Willmore functional