Lab Home | Phone | Search
Center for Nonlinear Studies  Center for Nonlinear Studies
 Home 
 People 
 Current 
 Executive Committee 
 Postdocs 
 Visitors 
 Students 
 Research 
 Publications 
 Conferences 
 Workshops 
 Sponsorship 
 Talks 
 Seminars 
 Postdoc Seminars Archive 
 Quantum Lunch 
 Quantum Lunch Archive 
 P/T Colloquia 
 Archive 
 Ulam Scholar 
 
 Postdoc Nominations 
 Student Requests 
 Student Program 
 Visitor Requests 
 Description 
 Past Visitors 
 Services 
 General 
 
 History of CNLS 
 
 Maps, Directions 
 CNLS Office 
 T-Division 
 LANL 
 
Monday, August 11, 2008
3:00 PM - 4:00 PM
CNLS Conference Room (TA-3, Bldg 1690)

Colloquium

Exactly Solvable Models of Random Surfaces

Douglas Abraham
University of Oxford

A general introduction will be given to the theory of Structure and Phase Transitions in equilibrium statistical mechanical models of surfaces, stressing the significance of exact solutions. The concepts of wetting and of roughening will be explained. This will be followed by the main part, which is the exact solution of certain Volmer-Weber and Stransky-Krastanov surface-structural models in equilibrium statistical mechanics; (these models are usually encountered in dynamical theory of epitaxy). This new work is in collaboration with C.M. Newman, CIMS, NYU. It makes use of a mapping from a 3-d surface model to an associated statistical mechanical model, which is then studied by exact solution techniques and by theory of interacting percolation. The principal physical relevance of this work is to the theory of heterogeneous catalysis. It also affords a practical example of Schramm-Lowner evolution (SLE), a subject of considerable current interest in mathematical physics.

Host: Avadh Saxena, T-11