Chaos and Control

December 1, 2022
3:00-4:15pm ET
Cummings 270, Zoom
Speaker: Liz Bradley, University of Colorado Boulder
Host: Diane Souvaine

Abstract

Understanding and exploiting the special properties of nonlinear and chaotic dynamics can lead not only to increases in scientific understanding, but also to engineering designs that vastly improve the performance of many practical and useful systems: spacecraft trajectories that require less fuel, for example, or tracking circuitry with broader capture ranges and fuel injectors that mix gasoline and air more effectively. Control strategies that leverage chaos's characteristic geometry, ergodicity, and sensitivity to attain such improvements rely on powerful computational tools that use a combination of quantitative and qualitative reasoning to work with the special properties involved. This talk will begin with a review of the mathematical theory and computational techniques that are used in the field of nonlinear dynamics, and then cover a variety of interesting examples ranging from science and engineering to dance.

Bio:

Elizabeth Bradley holds SB, SM, and PhD degrees from MIT. She has been a member of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Colorado since 1993 and recently completed a term as the chair of the Computing Research Association's Computing Community Consortium (CCC). Her research interests include nonlinear dynamics and nonlinear time-series analysis. She has mentored more than 90 graduate, undergraduate, and high-school students and half a dozen postdocs. She is a member of the external faculty of the Santa Fe Institute and the recipient of a National Young Investigator award, Packard and Radcliffe Fellowships, and the University of Colorado system's highest teaching award.

Please join meeting in Cummings 270 or via Zoom.

Join Zoom Meeting: https://tufts.zoom.us/j/96038251227

Meeting ID: 960 3825 1227

Passcode: see colloquium email

Dial by your location: +1 646 558 8656 US (New York)

Meeting ID: 960 3825 1227

Passcode: see colloquium email