See the calendar below for future seminars and events.
Following every Thursday seminar, attendees are welcome to come to one of our SMRI Afternoon Teas which take place on Thursday afternoons at 2pm on the Quadrangle Terrace, accessed through the entry in Quadrangle Lobby P and via the SMRI Common Room on level 4.
Upcoming and current events: seminars, workshops and course
Geometry & Topology Seminar
Date & time: Wednesday 22nd April 2026 at 12 pm
Location: SMRI Seminar Room (A12 Macleay Room 301)
Speaker: Adam Rennie, University of Wollongong
Abstract: TBA
SMRI Seminar
Date & time: Thursday 16th April 2026 at 1 pm
Location: SMRI Seminar Room (A12 Macleay Room 301)
Speaker: Patrice Koehl, UC Davis
Abstract: TBA
Seminar on Canonical Bases in Representation Theory
Dates and times: Wednesdays from 10 am –12 pm for the seminar, followed by a weekly exercise session from 1 pm –2 pm, starting from Wednesday 4th March, 2026
Location: SMRI Seminar Room (A12 Macleay Room 301)
Details: In this seminar, we aim to study the answers of the following motivating questions regarding irreducible representations of semisimple Lie algebras and related structures:
- How can we compute their characters?
- How can we compute tensor product decompositions?
- What are “canonical bases” for these modules?
A powerful tool introduced in the early 1990s, known as the canonical basis (Lusztig) or crystal basis (Kashiwara), provides a model to answer these questions.
We will start by learning about prototypical constructions that serve as motivation, before proceeding to the construction and properties of these modern bases: first studying Lusztig’s approach, and then Kashiwara’s approach.
This seminar will focus on the main ingredients and recipes used to motivate, construct and describe these bases: Kazhdan-Lusztig bases, Gelfand-Tsetlin bases, Lusztig’s algebraic construction, Lusztig’s geometric/topological construction, and Kashiwara’s crystal/global bases. More information on the Canonical Bases in Representation Theory website.