PIMS-CSC Distinguished Speaker Series: Andrea Bertozzi (UCLA)

There is an extensive applied mathematics literature developed for problems in the biological and physical sciences. Our understanding of social science problems from a mathematical standpoint is less developed, but also presents some very interesting problems, especially for young researchers. This lecture uses crime as a case study for using applied mathematical techniques in a social science application and covers a variety of mathematical methods that are applicable to such problems. We will review recent work on agent based models, methods in linear and nonlinear partial differential equations, variational methods for inverse problems and statistical point process models. From an application standpoint we will look at problems in residential burglaries and gang crimes. Examples will consider both ``bottom up'' and "top down'' approaches to understanding the mathematics of crime, and how the two approaches could converge to a unifying theory.

Autobiography:

Professor Bertozzi, who completed her PhD in Mathematics in 1991 at Princeton, was Professor of Mathematics and Physics at Duke University before taking a Professorship at UCLA in 2003. She is one of the preeminent applied mathematicians worldwide and a recipient of many awards and honours, including a Sloan Research Fellowship, ONR Young Investigator Award, Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, and Sonia Kovalevsky Prize. In 2010 she was selected as a SIAM Fellow and elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Professor Bertozzi has over 100 publications, serves on many editorial and and advisory boards, and has mentored dozens of PhD students and postdoctoral fellows. She has given innumerable plenary talks and distinguished lectures, in part because of her reputation for interesting and spirited presentations.