Brauer Lecture
Brauer Lectures
The UNC Alfred T. Brauer Lectures
Alfred Theodor Brauer, 1894–1985, had a profound impact on the Mathematics Department at UNC. Born in Germany, he studied at the University of Berlin and earned his degree in 1928 under Issai Schur. He continued lecturing there until 1936 when he was forced to resign by the Nazi government due to his Jewish heritage. In 1937 he declined Hermann Weyl’s invitation to come to the United States and, instead, gave the names of other he felt were in more immediate need of help. From 1936-1938, Brauer continued research while teaching junior-high level mathematics at a private school in Berlin until “Kristallnacht.” He successfully fled the country in 1939, finally accepting Weyl’s invitation to the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He came to North Carolina in 1942, teaching here until his retirement in 1966.
During this time at UNC, he founded the Mathematics and Physics Library, using his knowledge and expertise to establish a superb collection. In appreciation for this effort the library was named for him in 1976, later being absorbed into the UNC Libraries system. Alfred Brauer was honored by the University with the award of a Kenan professorship in 1959, the Tanner Award for excellence in undergraduate teaching in 1965, and an honorary doctor of legal letters degree in 1972. He has also received honors from outside the University, including the Oak Ridge Science Award and the G.W.F. Hegel Medal from the University of Berlin.
In 1975 an Alfred T. Brauer Instructorship was created at Wake Forest University, where he taught after his retirement from the University of North Carolina. The Alfred Brauer Fund was established by the Department of Mathematics in 1984 on the occasion of his ninetieth birthday. For more on Brauer’s biography, see the article “Alfred T. Brauer: Teacher, Mathematician and Developer of Libraries”.
2023 Brauer Lecturer
The 2023 lectures were given by Carlos Kenig, Louis Block Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Chicago.
Carlos earned his PhD at the University of Chicago in 1978 under the direction of Alberto Calderon. After holding positions at Princeton and Minnesota, he returned to the University of Chicago in 1985. Carlos’s recognitions include the Salem Prize (1984), the Bocher Prize (2008), three time ICM speaker (1986, 2002, 2010), elected member of the National Academy of Sciences (2014), and former President of the International Mathematical Union. Carlos is an expert in harmonic analysis and partial differential equations, and he is an excellent expositor and lecturer for both specialized and general audiences.
The lectures took place February 6-8, 2023.
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- In this lecture I will describe the progress made in the last
14 years, in our understanding of the long-time behavior of large solutions
to the energy critical focusing nonlinear wave equation. In the last part
of the talk I will concentrate on progress (with Duyckaerts and Merle) on
the asymptotic simplification for large time, into sums of modulated static
solutions plus a linear term, in all odd dimensions, in the radial case.
- In this lecture I will describe the progress made in the last
- Lecture 2: Wave maps into the sphere
- In this talk we will introduce wave maps, an important
geometric flow, and discuss, for the case when the target is the sphere, the
asymptotic behavior near the ground state (without symmetry) and recent
results in the general case (under co-rotational symmetry) in joint work with
Duyckaerts, Martel and Merle.
- In this talk we will introduce wave maps, an important
- Lecture 3: New channels of energy for wave equations, new non-radiative solutions and soliton resolution
- We will discuss the role of non-radiative solutions to nonlinear wave equations, in connection with soliton resolution. Using new
channels of energy estimates we characterize all radial non-radiative solutions for a general class of nonlinear wave equations. This is joint work with
C.Collot, T. Duyckaerts and F. Merle.
- We will discuss the role of non-radiative solutions to nonlinear wave equations, in connection with soliton resolution. Using new
We look forward to seeing everyone at these special lectures.
Past Brauer Lectures
To honor the memory of Alfred Brauer and to recognize his many contributions to the Mathematics Department at UNC, the Alfred Brauer Lectures were begun in 1985.
The 2019 Brauer Lectures were given by Dr. Peter Constantin of Princeton University.
The 2018 Brauer Lectures were given by Dr. Mina Aganagic on April 10-12, 2018.
The 2017 Brauer Lectures were given by Mikhail Khovanov, on March 29-31, 2017.
The 2016 Brauer Lectures were given by Stan Osher, on April 20-22, 2016.
The 2015 Brauer Lectures were given by Michael Hopkins, on March 23-25, 2015.
The 2014 Brauer Lectures were given by Simon Donaldson, on March 24-26, 2014.
The 2013 Brauer Lectures were given by Vaughan Jones, University of California at Berkeley and Vanderbilt University, on March 4-6, 2013.
The 2012 Brauer Lectures were given by Alex Lubotzky, Hebrew University, on April 16-18, 2012.
The 2011 Brauer Lectures were given by Gerard Laumon of CNRS and Paris-Sud, Orsay, on March 28-30, 2011.
The 2010 Brauer Lectures were given by Alex Eskin of the University of Chicago.
Brauer Lectures prior to 2010