Beijing-Moscow Mathematics Colloquium (online)
Abstract
In this talk, I will discuss some developments in 3-manifold topology of this century regarding finite covering spaces. These developments led to the resolution of Thurston’s virtual Haken conjecture and other related conjectures around 2012. Since then, people have been seeking for new applications of those techniques and their combination with other branches of mathematics.
Bio
Yi Liu is a professor at Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research (BICMR) in Peking University. His research interest lies primarily in 3-manifold topology and hyperbolic geometry. He received his Ph.D. degree in 2012 in University of California at Berkeley. In 2017, he received the Qiushi Outstanding Young Scholar Award. He has been a principal investigator of the NSFC Outstanding Young Scholar since 2019. Below are some selected research works of Yi Liu: (1) proving J. Simon’s conjecture about knot groups (joint with I. Agol, 2012); (2) resolving fundamental properties of the L2 Alexander torsion for 3-manifolds, (2017); (3) proving C. T. McMullen’s conjecture about virtual homological spectral radii of surface automorphisms (2020).
