For more information about this meeting, contact Sergei Tabachnikov.
| Title: | Spiral Waves in Excitable Media |
|---|
| Seminar: | Department of Mathematics Colloquium |
|---|
| Speaker: | De Witt Sumners, Florida State University |
|---|
| Abstract: |
|---|
| Rotating spiral wave patterns are a signature of oscillating chemical reactions (the Belusov-Zhabotinsky reaction, and AMP pulses in slime mold), and are believed to be involved in heart fibrillation and neural siezures. The organizing centers for spiral wave patterns are points in 2-dimensional excitable media, and curves in 3-dimensional excitable media, so codimension 2 topology (knot theory) is useful in the analysis of these patterns. This talk will discuss a mathematical characterization of these spiral wave patterns and their time evolution, in terms of phase maps and the homotopy of phase maps. A quantization condition that is necessary and sufficient for the (mathematical) existence of a rotating spiral wave pattern will be derived. |
Room Reservation Information
| Room Number: | MB114 |
|---|
| Date: | 11 / 06 / 2008 |
|---|
| Time: | 04:00pm - 05:00pm |
|---|
