03/12/2004, 15:00 — 16:00 — Conference Room, Instituto de Sistemas e Robótica, North Tower, 7th floor, IST João Pimentel Nunes, IST/DM
From Maxwell to the Matrix
Taking the Maxwell equations as a point of departure, we will describe some exciting ideas from modern fundamental physics and will mention part of their mathematical significance. Way beyond Maxwell theory, we will find that large random matrices appear on the scene. Surprisingly, the same mathematical object also seems to find many applications in engineering and we will (very) briefly mention a few.