The Complementary Program has a limited number of memberships that are open to mathematicians whose interests are not closely related to the core programs; special consideration is given to mathematicians who are partners of an invited member of a core program. 

The Summer Schools in Probability are a highlight of Canadian probability and are internationally significant.  Launched by PIMS in 2004, the school takes the form of two main 4-week courses along with three mini-courses. The schools have played a major role in the development of an exceptionally strong community of young probabilist in Canada, North America and overseas. This will be the 13th time this school has run.

SLMath's Summer Research in Mathematics (SRiM) program provides space, funding, and the opportunity for in-person collaboration to small groups of mathematicians, whose ongoing research may have been disproportionately affected by various obstacles including family obligations, professional isolation, or access to funding. Through this effort, SLMath aims to mitigate the obstacles faced by these groups, improve the odds of research project completion, and deepen their research experience. The ultimate goal of this program is to enhance the mathematical sciences as a whole by positively affecting the research and careers of all of its participants and assisting their efforts to maintain involvement in the research community.

The MSRI-UP summer program is designed to serve a diverse group of undergraduate students who would like to conduct research in the mathematical sciences.

In 2025, MSRI-UP will focus on Quantitative Justice. The research program will be led by Dr. Omayra Y. Ortega, Associate Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Sonoma State University.

From micro to macro, sea ice supports life in the polar regions. Left: illustration of the porous sea ice microstructure, home to a microbial community of ice endemic organisms including bacteria and algae. Right: two penguins on Antarctic sea ice.

In this summer school, students will be introduced to mathematical and computational modeling of sea ice and polar ecosystems. As a material, sea ice is a multiscale composite structured on length scales ranging from tenths of millimeters to tens of kilometers. From tiny brine inclusions and surface melt ponds of increasing complexity, to ice floes of varying sizes in a seawater host, a principal challenge is how to find sea ice effective properties that are relevant to larger scale models, given data on smaller scale structures. Similarly, the sea ice ecosystem ranges from algae living in the brine inclusions to charismatic megafauna like penguins and polar bears, whose diets depend critically, down the line, on the tiny sea ice extremophiles. The dynamics of sea ice microbial communities are regulated by the physics of the ice microstructure, and, in turn, many of these microbes modify their environment by secreting extracellular polymeric substances. In addition to sea ice and its ecosystems, we will consider broader mathematical models including energy balance models, tipping points, and global circulation models.

<p>A plane partition and an hourglass plabic graph</p>

This school will introduce students to a range of powerful combinatorial tools used to understand algebraic objects ranging from the homogeneous coordinate ring of the Grassmannian to symmetric functions.   The summer school will center around two main lecture series "Webs and Plabic Graphs" and "Vertex Models and Applications".   While the exact applications differ, both courses will center on graphical models for algebraic problems closely related to Grassmannian and its generalizations.  This school will be accessible to a wide range of students.  Students will leave the school with a solid grasp of the combinatorics of webs, plabic graphs, and the six-vertex model, an understanding of their algebraic applications, and a taste of current research directions.

<p>The discriminant ∆ detects singular varieties. The picture shows three different scenarios: solutions of quadratic polynomials, cubic plane curves and cubic surfaces.</p>

This summer school will offer a hands-on introduction to discriminants, with a view towards modern applications. Starting from the basics of computational algebraic geometry and toric geometry, the school will gently introduce participants to the foundations of discriminants. A particular emphasis will be put on computing discriminants of polynomial systems using computer algebra software. Then, we will dive into three applications of discriminants: algebraic statistics, geometric modeling, and particle physics. Here, discriminants contribute to the study of maximum likelihood estimation, to finding practical parametrizations of geometric objects, and to computations of scattering amplitudes. We will explain recently discovered unexpected connections between these three applications. In addition to lectures, the summer school will have daily collaborative exercise sessions which will be guided by the teaching assistants and will include software demonstrations.

ADJOINT is a yearlong program that provides opportunities for U.S. mathematicians to conduct collaborative research on topics at the forefront of mathematical and statistical research. Participants will spend two weeks taking part in an intensive collaborative summer session at SLMath. The two-week summer session for ADJOINT 2025 will take place June 30 - July 11, 2025 in Berkeley, California. Researchers can participate in either of the following ways: (1) joining ADJOINT small groups under the guidance of some of the nation's foremost mathematicians and statisticians to expand their research portfolio into new areas, or (2) applying to Self-ADJOINT as part of an existing or newly-formed independent research group ((three-to-five participants is preferred) to work on a new or established research project. Throughout the following academic year, the program provides conference and travel support to increase opportunities for collaboration, maximize researcher visibility, and engender a sense of community among participants. 

The school will consist of two courses: Homological Mirror Symmetry and Algebraic Models for Spaces. These courses will be planned and taught by organisers with the help of teaching assistants for the problem sessions. The school will be aimed at a wide range of graduate students, from students with a Bachelor degree to beginning PhD students. The lectures and problem sessions will be complemented by a poster session in week one and a total of four introductory research talks on Friday afternoons. 

One of the core elements of applied mathematics is mathematical modeling consisting of nonlinear equations such as ODEs, and PDEs. A fundamental difficulty which arises is that most nonlinear models cannot be solved in closed form. Computer assisted proofs are at the forefront of modern mathematics and have led to many important recent mathematical advances. They provide a way of melding analytical techniques with numerical methods, in order to provide rigorous statements for mathematical models that could not be treated by either method alone. In this summer school, students will review standard computational and analytical techniques, learn to combine these techniques with more specialized methods of interval arithmetic, and apply these methods to establish rigorous results in otherwise intractable problems

<p>The traditional scientific method cycle, with Francis Bacon and Rene Descartes, its concievers in the center, alongside formal and statistical AI machinary, as a propsective evolution of the method.&nbsp;<br />&nbsp;</p>

The summer school aims to expose participants to formal methods that can facilitate principled scientific discovery. The school will cover some of the basic automated statistical inference (in the form of machine learning techniques) and reasoning methods that are commonly used in scientific discovery, as well as novel techniques developed to tackle open questions and issues. This summer school will address novel computational methods for scientific discovery and focus on fusing axiomatic knowledge and experimental data to enable principled derivations of models of natural phenomena along with certificates of the consistency of these models with background knowledge specified as axioms.

<p>Flats and hyperbolic planes in a higher rank symmetric space</p> Drawn by Steve Trettel.

Lie groups are central objects in modern mathematics; they arise as the automorphism groups of many homogeneous spaces, such as flag manifolds and Riemannian symmetric spaces. Often, one can construct manifolds locally modelled on these homogeneous spaces by taking quotients of their subsets by discrete subgroups of their automorphism groups. Studying such discrete subgroups of Lie groups is an active and growing area of mathematical research. The objective of this summer school is to introduce young researchers to a class of discrete subgroups of Lie groups, called Anosov subgroups.

<p>Laminations arise naturally in hyperbolic geometry and (pseudo-) Anosov flows [Image by Jeffrey Brock]</p>

This school will serve as an introduction to the SLMath semester “Topological and Geometric Structures in Low-Dimensions”.  The school consists of two mini-courses: one on Teichmüller Theory and Hyperbolic 3-Manifolds and the other on Anosov Flows on Geometric 3-Manifolds.  Both topics lie at the interface of low-dimensional geometric topology (specifically, surfaces, foliations, and 3-manifolds) and low-dimensional dynamics.  The first course will be targeted towards students who have completed the standard first year graduate courses in geometry, topology, and analysis while the second course will geared towards more advanced students who are closer to beginning research. However, we expect that all students will benefit from both courses.

Top: Neutrino interactions and neutrino-atom interactions. Bottom: Collision of two "waves"

The focus of the proposed program is on so-called kinetic equations, describing the evolution of the of many-particle interacting systems. These models have the form of statistical flows, with their solutions being either a single or multiple point probability density functions or measures, supported in a space of attributes. The attributes are problem-dependent and can be molecular velocity, energy, opinion, wealth, and many others. The flow then predicts the evolution of the probability measure in time, position in space, and the interchanging of the particles' states by the transition probability.

The program will strive to give an overview of the novel mathematical tools used in kinetic theory through a broad range of classical and more recent applications.

Solution to the geometric stochastic heat equation on the sphere at a fixed time

The topic Singular Stochastic Partial Differential Equations (singular SPDE) has rapidly grown to be an active research area at the interface of Stochastic Analysis and PDEs on one hand, and Mathematical Physics on the other hand. During this decade we have witnessed a series of tremendous breakthroughs in the solution theories of SPDEs, universality problems, large-scale asymptotic behaviors of solutions, and foundational relations with quantum field theories and geometry. Many long-standing problems have been resolved via newly developed methods – notably the theories of regularity structures and paracontrolled distributions – and deep connections with other fields are quickly emerging.

It is a natural time to convene a large-scale semester program.

The Complementary Program has a limited number of memberships that are open to mathematicians whose interests are not closely related to the core programs; special consideration is given to mathematicians who are partners of an invited member of a core program.

The Pathways workshop will bring together leading experts working at the intersection of kinetic theory and stochastic partial differential equations (SPDEs).

Parameter scan for deploying external electric field to control two-stream instability for Vlasov-Poisson.

The goal of the workshop is to introduce non-experts to two active research areas: kinetic theory and stochastic partial differential equations. Kinetic theory studies the properties of interacting particle systems modeling various processes in non-equilibrium statistical mechanics. Stochastic partial differential equations describe dynamics subjected to random noises. The methods from the two areas complement each other in studies of the phenomena arising in physics, economics, life sciences, etc.

Tribute to Hamilton's graffiti of the Quaternion Division Algebra, County Dublin, Ireland. Photo: Professor Peter Gallagher, Director Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies Dunsink Observatory (courtesy DIAS)

Infinite-dimensional division algebras are essential in noncommutative algebra and noncommutative algebraic geometry, yet they have remained cryptic and largely unclassified. This workshop will address three key classical open problems concerning them: the Kurosh Problem, the Free Subalgebra Problem and Artin's Conjecture. We will review decades of progress on these wide-open problems and emphasize novel techniques and emerging theories and concepts that show promise in facilitating breakthroughs.

<p>This figure depicts dynamics of flows on convex cocompact hyperbolic 3-manifolds; where the girl is a traveller along a horocycle.</p>

This research program will bring together two intellectual communities that have made significant advances in the study of discrete subgroups of higher rank semisimple Lie groups: the homogeneous dynamics community and the community studying geometric structures and Anosov groups.

The stable and unstable foliations near a singular orbit of a pseudo- Anosov flow in 3 dimensions. Courtesy Michael Landry.

Low dimensional topology is a meeting place for many objects and ideas from diverse areas of mathematics, including foliation theory, geometry, and smooth and conformal dynamics.   For instance, many foliations on 3-manifolds admit transverse flows, connecting (local) leafwise homeomorphisms to flow dynamics and the mapping class groups of the leaves.  Leafwise conformal or hyperbolic structures can be approached through Teichmüller theory, and connect again to one-dimensional dynamics through "universal circles" organizing compactifications of all the leaves or of the flow space.  Many of these ideas originate in work of Thurston but in recent years have diverged and are ripe for reconnection.  

The program will bring together experts in all these fields together with younger researchers, who together can form new connections and open new areas for exploration.

This workshop features a series of invited talks by experts across the fields of low-dimensional topology, homogeneous dynamics, and the geometry of symmetric spaces. Spanning all career stages, the event aims to foster a collaborative and supportive environment, particularly for early-career mathematicians, encouraging engagement, learning, and exploration in a welcoming academic setting.

The joint introductory workshop for the programs in Geometry and Dynamics for Discrete Subgroups of Higher Rank Lie Groups and Topological and Geometric Structures in Low Dimensions will feature lectures introducing subjects of interest to both programs, including Teichmuller Theory, geometry in higher rank, foliations and flows, Anosov groups and thermodynamic formalism,  mapping class groups, counting and equidistribution, and related topics. Minicourses will be targeted at early career researchers as well as specialists looking to find connections between the different subjects.

<p>Illustrated by Rok Gregoric</p>

The upcoming SLMath program is organized around key themes of “higher” quantization and mirror symmetry as they impact and elucidate a wide variety of questions in representation theory. The program will bring together experts and young researchers from algebra, geometry, physics and number theory to help develop and disseminate this unified vision of a rapidly evolving field, exploring the mathematical consequences of the examples, structures, and dualities discovered in physics.

Tremendous progress has been made using motivic techniques in geometric questions for affine algebraic varieties, especially those involving algebraic vector bundles. Computations in classical algebraic topology have been improved by motivic techniques, e.g., related to the problem of computing homotopy groups of spheres. Moreover, the theory has identified new structures of interest in arithmetic situations. Transformative recent progress in motivic homotopy theory has only broadened the scope for potential applications of motivic techniques, as well as new avenues of interaction with other areas of mathematics. This program will build on previous successes, explaining the tools that have been developed and how to use them, analyzing questions of the sort described above and identifying new domains where motivic techniques will be successful.

Image by Elliot Kienzle

This workshop will bring together theoretical physicists, representation theorists, algebraic geometers and symplectic geometers interested the connections between quantum field theory and geometric representation theory. The main topics to be discussed are mathematical aspects of 2d, 3d and 4d supersymmetric field theories, such as: topological twists and the resulting Higgs and Coulomb branches, relations to quantization and categorification, representations of vertex operator algebras, connections to enumerative geometry and quantum K-theory and elliptic cohomology, relations to knot homology and, finally, connections to the (relative) geometric Langlands program.

Tropical surfaces. Images courtesy of Lars Allermann.

Tropical geometry can be viewed as a degenerate version of algebraic geometry,where the role of algebraic varieties is played by certain polyhedral complexes. As the degeneration process, called tropicalization, preserves many fundamental properties, tropical geometry provides important bridges and an exchange of methods between algebraic geometry, symplectic geometry and convex geometry; these links have been extremely fruitful and gave rise to remarkable results during the last 20 years. The main focus of the program will be on the most significant recent developments in tropical geometry and its applications. The following topics are particularly influential in the area and will be central in the program:

• real aspects of tropical geometry;
• tropical mirror symmetry and non-Archimedean geometry;
• tropical phenomena in symplectic geometry;
• matroids, combinatorial and algebraic aspects;
• tropical moduli spaces;
• tropical geometry and A1-homotopy theory.

Picture of an amplituhedron

Algebraic combinatorics is an area of mathematics that employs methods in abstract algebra in combinatorial contexts, and that uses combinatorial methods to approach problems in algebra. Some important topics are symmetric functions, Young tableaux, matroids, Coxeter combinatorics. There are links to computer algebra (sage-combinat), number theory (L-functions), representation theory, and mathematical physics through Macdonald processes and integrability. The work on the totally positive Grassmannian also gave rise to beautiful results in mathematical physics: for example KP solitons and Scattering Amplitudes. Schubert calculus is an important part of algebraic combinatorics and is now at the frontier with k-Schur functions, which first came up in the theory of Macdonald polynomials.

Inverse problems (IP) arise in all fields of science and technology where a cause for an observed or desired effect is sought. In the last 50 years or so there has been substantial progress in the mathematical understanding of these problems but many questions remain open. The mathematics of these problems involves many areas in Mathematics including PDE, differential geometry, integral geometry, probability, statistics, complex analysis, numerical analysis, mathematical physics, data science, etc. Since the 2010 program at the then-Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (now Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute), there has been significant progress in inverse problems; many of the advances can be traced back to that program. However, there are still deep open questions remaining as well, some of which are discussed in this proposal. New research topics include the connection between IP and machine learning, IP for nonlinear equations, IP for nonlocal operators, and connections between statistics and IP.

The field of Geoemtric Measure Theory (GMT)has become vast and many gaps between disparate areas have emerged. This thematic semester will bring together researchers from every corner of the field, to kick-start new interactions and discoveries. In light of the many exciting advancements and potential for future breakthroughs, this as a crucial moment to bring old and new members of the GMT community together. The program will encourage interactions between established experts, emerging researchers and students, allowing for the sharing of key idea that brought to the recent developments and helping to shape a research agenda for the future.

This summer school offers an exceptional opportunity for participants to delve into the intricate realm of statistical optimal transport theory. This captivating field stands at the crossroads of multiple disciplines, drawing from a rich tapestry of mathematical insights from diverse subjects, including partial differential equations, stochastic analysis, convex geometry, statistics, and machine learning, crafting a vibrant and interdisciplinary landscape. The foremost objective of this summer school is to create a dynamic learning environment that unites students from diverse backgrounds such as PDE theory, probability, or optimal transport. 

<p>A display of the evolution of an Erdos-Renyi random graph .&nbsp;</p>

Random graphs are ubiquitous in modern probability theory. Besides their intrinsic mathematical beauty, they are also used to model complex networks. In the early 2000’s, I. Benjamini and O. Schramm introduced a mathematical framework in which they endowed the set of locally finite rooted connected graphs with the structure of a Polish space, called the local topology. The goal of this summer school is to introduce the framework of local limits of random graphs, the concepts of Benjamini-Schramm (or unbiased) limits and unimodularity, as well as the most important applications. The lectures will be delivered by Nicolas Curien (Prof. Paris-Saclay University) and Justin Salez (Prof. Université Paris-Dauphine) and will be complemented by many problem sessions, where students will work in small groups under the guidance of teaching assistants, who are researchers in the field. 

<p>A minimal free resolution supported on a simplicial complex</p>

The 2025 SMS will allow graduate students to learn about a number of recent trends and advances in the field of commutative algebra. The aim of the SMS is to provide an “on-ramp” for graduate students interested in algebra, combinatorics, and/or algebraic combinatorics to learn more about commutative algebra’s interaction with these fields. The introductory courses will introduce fundamental skills in commutative algebra, the more intermediate courses will expose students to cutting-edge research in the field. The school will focus on four topics within commutative algebra: Combinatorial Methods, Homological Methods, Computational Methods, and Characteristic p Methods. The SMS will provide both a series of introductory lectures and intermediate/advanced lectures from leaders in one of the four areas. The lectures will include a series of problem sessions that will allow participants to develop and hone their skills in these areas, which will be especially helpful for new people to the field. Participants will be encouraged to work collaboratively, both to enhance their own mathematical networks as well as to promote future collaborations beyond the school.