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Simons Foundation

Simons Foundation Lectures

A Mathematics , Science and Education podcast

#4 in Mathematics · 🇮🇳 #17 in Mathematics · 🇺🇸
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About the show

The Simons Foundation’s mission is to advance the frontiers of research in mathematics and the basic sciences.Co-founded in New York City by Jim and Marilyn Simons, the foundation exists to support basic — or discovery-driven — scientific research undertaken in the pursuit of understanding the phenomena of our world.The Simons Foundation’s support of science takes two forms: We support research by making grants to individual investigators and their projects through academic institutions, and, with the launch of the Flatiron Institute in 2016, we now conduct scientific research in-house, supporting teams of top computational scientists.Links:Simons Foundation: https://www.simonsfoundation.orgFlatiron Institute: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/flatiron/Simons Foundation Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SimonsFoundationFlatiron Institute Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FlatironInstitute/Simons Foundation Twitter: https://twitter.com/simonsfdnFlatiron Institute Twitter: https://twitter.com/flatironinst

Newest episodes

Mathematical Impressions: Bicycle Tracks

9 min

A nice mathematical puzzle, with a solution anyone can understand, is to determine the direction a bicycle went when you come upon its tracks. The answer involves thinking about tangent lines, geometric constraints and the bicycle's steering mechanism.Uploaded 22-05-14http://www.simonsfoundation.org/multimedia/mathematical-impressions-bicycle-tracks/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sheperd Doeleman: Taking Pictures and Making Movies of Supermassive Black Holes (October 14, 2026)

1 hr 5 min

In this Presidential Lecture, Shep Doeleman will present the first results and the future directions of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). The EHT is a global array of radio dishes that successfully imaged the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy and the black hole at the center of the Milky Way, both of which exhibit the predicted strong gravitational lensing. Subsequent observations have revealed ordered magnetic fields on horizon scales with implications for how black holes launch relativistic jets of material. What’s next? The next-generation EHT (ngEHT) is a project to expand the EHT in several ways, enabling full-color, high-definition movies of black holes to pursue the next big questions.Uploaded 26-10-26For more information please visit: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/events/taking-pictures-and-making-movies-of-supermassive-black-holes/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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All episodes

The newest 50 of 221 episodes

Mathematical Impressions: Bicycle Tracks

9 min

A nice mathematical puzzle, with a solution anyone can understand, is to determine the direction a bicycle went when you come upon its tracks. The answer involves thinking about tangent lines, geometric constraints and the bicycle's steering mechanism.Uploaded 22-05-14http://www.simonsfoundation.org/multimedia/mathematical-impressions-bicycle-tracks/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sheperd Doeleman: Taking Pictures and Making Movies of Supermassive Black Holes (October 14, 2026)

1 hr 5 min

In this Presidential Lecture, Shep Doeleman will present the first results and the future directions of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). The EHT is a global array of radio dishes that successfully imaged the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy and the black hole at the center of the Milky Way, both of which exhibit the predicted strong gravitational lensing. Subsequent observations have revealed ordered magnetic fields on horizon scales with implications for how black holes launch relativistic jets of material. What’s next? The next-generation EHT (ngEHT) is a project to expand the EHT in several ways, enabling full-color, high-definition movies of black holes to pursue the next big questions.Uploaded 26-10-26For more information please visit: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/events/taking-pictures-and-making-movies-of-supermassive-black-holes/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ziquan Zhuang— Boundedness in General Type MMP (Oct. 3, 2025)

1 hr 3 min

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-moduli-of-varieties-annual-meeting-2025/2025 Annual Meeting of the Simons Collaboration on Moduli of VarietiesSimons FoundationOctober 2-3, 2025Uploaded 27-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mathematical Impressions: Attesting to Atoms

9 min

Can you combine simple observations and mathematical thinking to show that atoms exist?Uploaded 22-05-14http://www.simonsfoundation.org/multimedia/attesting-to-atoms/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chenyang Xu— Properness of K-moduli (Oct. 3, 2025)

59 min

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-moduli-of-varieties-annual-meeting-2025/2025 Annual Meeting of the Simons Collaboration on Moduli of VarietiesSimons FoundationOctober 2-3, 2025Uploaded 27-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ivan Cheltsov— Finite Simple Subgroups of Real Cremona Groups (Oct. 3, 2025)

58 min

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-moduli-of-varieties-annual-meeting-2025/2025 Annual Meeting of the Simons Collaboration on Moduli of VarietiesSimons FoundationOctober 2-3, 2025Uploaded 27-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cryo-EM Workshop - Roy Lederman (August 9, 2019)

39 min

More details: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/nyc-computational-cryo-em-summer-workshop/Uploaded 26-08-19 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kristin DeVleming— The Hassett-Keel Program in Genus 4 (Oct. 2, 2025)

59 min

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-moduli-of-varieties-annual-meeting-2025/2025 Annual Meeting of the Simons Collaboration on Moduli of VarietiesSimons FoundationOctober 2-3, 2025Uploaded 27-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

János Kollár— Abelian Fibrations (Oct. 2, 2025)

55 min

https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-moduli-of-varieties-annual-meeting-2025/2025 Annual Meeting of the Simons Collaboration on Moduli of VarietiesSimons FoundationOctober 2-3, 2025Uploaded 27-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Peter Bartlett — Gradient Optimization Methods... (Sept. 26, 2025)

1 hr 3 min

Peter Bartlett — Gradient Optimization Methods: Implicit Bias and Benefits of Early Stopping (Sept. 26, 2025)Uploaded 22-10-252025 Mathematical and Scientific Foundations of Deep Learning Annual Meetinghttps://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/mathematical-and-scientific-foundations-of-deep-learning-annual-meeting-2025/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cryo-EM Workshop - Ali Punjani (August 9, 2019)

37 min

More details: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/nyc-computational-cryo-em-summer-workshop/Uploaded 26-08-19 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rong Ge — Competing Mechanisms in Training Dynamics (Sept. 25, 2025)

1 hr 2 min

2025 Mathematical and Scientific Foundations of Deep Learning Annual Meetinghttps://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/mathematical-and-scientific-foundations-of-deep-learning-annual-meeting-2025/Uploaded 22-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

René Vidal — Learning Dynamics in the Feature-Learning Regime... (Sept. 25, 2025)

1 hr 4 min

René Vidal — Learning Dynamics in the Feature-Learning Regime: Implicit Bias, Robustness, and Low-Rank AdaptationUploaded 22-10-252025 Mathematical and Scientific Foundations of Deep Learning Annual Meetinghttps://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/mathematical-and-scientific-foundations-of-deep-learning-annual-meeting-2025/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

ICM 2026 Invited Section Lecture - Ivan Angiono

48 min

Pointed Hopf Algebras Revisited, with A View from Tensor CategoriesHopf algebras appear in connection with various problems in Pure Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, mainly through their categoriesof representations, which are examples of tensor categories. In recent years, there have been major advances in the classification of finite-dimensional Hopf algebras over the complex numbers, especially when restricted to the pointed case. In this talk, we will summarize the main results in this direction, stating the classification theorems recently obtained and the problems still open, and describing the tools needed to solve the problem by means of the so-called Lifting Method of Andruskiewitsch and Schneider. An important fact is that the category of comodules of a lifting (under the assumption of the classification theorems) is tensor equivalent to that of the associated graded objects, which in turn allows certain problems to be reduced to the associated graded pointed Hopf algebras. We will emphasise this point of view with applications to other contexts related, such as finite pointed tensor categories, Hopf algebras that do not satisfy the Chevalley property and their finite-dimensional Nichols algebras, and finally module categories over the categories of representations of pointed Hopf algebras.Uploaded 05-10-26 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hannah Bayer: IBL: Learning to work together (May 6, 2025)

20 min

The International Brain Laboratory is an experiment in building a large-scale distributed collaboration committed to open science. To achieve its goals, IBL had to address problems faced by collaborations of all sizes: shared decision making, the division of labor, authorship and credit assignment, and supporting career progression. In this talk I describe some of the lessons we have learned that we hope other scientists may find applicable to their own efforts.Uploaded 20-10-25 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lilia Boeri: Designing Next-Generation Superconductors through Pressure Quenching

1 hr 8 min

In this Presidential Lecture, Lilia Boeri will present cutting-edge research related to superconductivity. Eremets’ discovery of near room-temperature superconductivity in high-pressure hydrides marked a major turning point in the history of superconductivity, demonstrating that extreme pressure can stabilize phases with unprecedented properties that are unthinkable at ambient conditions. Ten years after the discovery of hydrogen sulfide superconductors, pressure quenching is emerging as a practical strategy to retain high-temperature phases at ambient pressure by preserving structures formed under extreme conditions.Uploaded 20-10-25For more information go here: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/designing-next-generation-superconductors-through-pressure-quenching/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lisa Fauci - Hydrodynamically-coupled oscillators in biofluids (December 17, 2019)

1 hr 0 min

Respiratory cilia that transport mucus in the lungs, spermatozoa that collectively move through the female reproductive tract, paddling appendages that propel a crawfish, and fish swimming in a school are all examples of oscillators that exert force on a surrounding fluid. Do the synchronous or phase-shifted periodic motions that we observe arise due to hydrodynamic coupling? We will discuss experiments and models of the self-organized pattern of beating flagella and cilia — from minimal models of colloidal particles driven by optical traps to more detailed models that include dynamics of the molecular motors driving the motion. We will also consider internal coupled oscillators that model neural signaling in a model of an undulatory swimmer with sensory feedback and examine the emergent swimming behavior of the coupled fluid-neural-muscle-body system. A long-term goal of this research is to investigate the relation of spinal chord injuries to movement in a very simple system. More details: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/ccb-colloquium-lisa-fauci/Uploaded 13-01-20 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Subir Sachdev - Ultra-Spooky Action at a Distance (January 22, 2019)

1 hr 0 min

Ultra-Spooky Action at a Distance: From Quantum Materials in the Lab to Black HolesThe strangest feature of quantum theory was dubbed “spooky action at a distance” by Albert Einstein. Today, scientists have convincing evidence that two quantum particles far apart can entangle with each other such that the observation of one can instantaneously determine the state of the other.Uploaded 24-01-20In this lecture, Subir Sachdev will describe how this quantum feature is playing a central role in many modern developments in physics. Quantum entanglement can occur on a macroscopic scale with trillions of electrons, leading to new forms of ‘ultra-quantum matter’ with properties of technological importance. In high-temperature superconductors, such as YBa2Cu3O7, there appears to be a ‘quantum critical point’ whose entanglement structure is being explored by experiment and theory. Related entanglement structures arise across black hole horizons, and recent advances have shed new light on Stephen Hawking’s information paradox. Sachdev will use simple models of entanglement to describe these mutually beneficial developments across different fields of physics. More details: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/ultra-spooky-action-at-a-distance-from-quantum-materials-in-the-lab-to-black-holes/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Laura Sommovigo and Shivam Pandey - From Simulations to Surveys... (Sept. 18, 2025)

54 min

From Simulations to Surveys: Building Realistic Mock Catalogs for Galaxies and the CMBUploaded 17-10-252025 Simons Collaboration on Learning the Universe Annual Meeting (September 18-19, 2025)https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/simons-collaboration-on-learning-the-universe-annual-meeting-2025/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jason Lerch - Autism, Autisms, or Neurodevelopmental Disorders? (January 29, 2020)

1 hr 0 min

If we had known back then what we know now, would we have the disorder names and categories that we do? In this lecture, Jason Lerch will explore the question: What do modern ways of looking at brains and genes tell us about autism — or autisms — and its relationship to attention deficit disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and other related disorders of brain development? More details: https://www.simonsfoundation.org/event/autism-autisms-or-neurodevelopmental-disorders/Uploaded 31-01-20 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

ICM 2026 Invited Section Lecture - Emanuel Milman

50 min

Multi-Bubble Isoperimetric ProblemsThe classical isoperimetric inequality in Euclidean space Rn states that among all sets of prescribed volume, the Euclidean ball (uniquely) minimizes surface area, explaining why a single soap bubble is always a round sphere. One may similarly consider isoperimetric problems on more general metric-measure spaces, such as on the n-sphere Sn and on n-dimensional Gaussian space Gn (i.e. Rn endowed with the standard Gaussian measure). More generally, we consider the multi-bubble isoperimetric problem, in which one prescribes the volumes of k greater then= 2 bubbles and minimizes their total surface area -– as any mutual interface will only be counted once, the bubbles are thus incentivized to clump together. The double-bubble problem (case k=2) on R3 was resolved by Hutchings, Morgan, Ritoré and Ros in 2000. We survey recent advancements in the characterization of multi-bubble isoperimetric minimizers on Gn, Rn and Sn, as well as the stability of soap bubble partitions. Based on joint works with Joe Neeman and Botong Xu. There will be many pictures!Uploaded 05-10-26 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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