The AMS typically meets 12:45-1:45PM on Thursdays in Room 164 of the Adel Mathematics Building. Any faculty, students, or friends of the department are welcome to attend. Seminar talks are typically rotated between faculty (and on occasion students or visitors) with research interests related to applied mathematics, widely defined to include almost anything from ordinary and partial differential equations, dynamical systems, nonlinear and linear functional analysis, numerical analysis, optimization, operations research, scientific computing, modeling, and advanced physics. If you are interested/willing to give a talk, please contact John Neuberger, Colloquium Chair and AMS Coordinator, Fall 2015.
Wilson Lough is speaking Thursday December 3rd and 10th over his independent study with Dr. Gary Bowman:
Lie Groups in Physics: Symmetry, Degeneracy, and Conservation Principles
The notion of symmetry plays a fundamental role in physics. We can choose some transformation rule, like rotations or translations, and compare the original system with the transformed system. If there is some resemblance between the two we say the system exhibits a symmetry. The symmetry of a system implies certain relations among observable quantities. Symmetries of physical systems can be expressed elegantly in the language of Lie groups and their Lie Algebras. This talk will present basic facts about Lie groups, Lie algebras, and their connection with symmetries in both classical and quantum physics. We will examine the relationship between SO(3) and angular momentum in classical mechanics and the connection between SU(2) and spin in quantum mechanics.