Counting Curves: Tales from the Enumerative Crypt
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Susan Colley
Department of Mathematics, Oberlin College
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Abstract:
I will talk about the Steiner problem of five conics: to determine how many
conics are simultaneously tangent to five others. I will provide some of the
history surrounding this problem and an idea of some of the ingredients needed
to solve it. Finally, I will turn to modern times and briefly sketch joint work
with Gary Kennedy (Ohio State) and Lars Ernström (Ericsson) that uses
mathematical techniques inspired by ideas in theoretical string theory to
address some analogous questions about "higher-order" contact of plane
curves.
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