UniversalMap (101001124)

  https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101001124

  Horizon 2020 (2014-2020)

  Universality of random planar maps and trees

  ERC CONSOLIDATOR GRANTS (ERC-2020-COG)

  geometry  ·  combinatorics  ·  complex analysis  ·  theoretical physics

  2022-01-01 Start Date (YY-MM-DD)

  2026-12-31 End Date (YY-MM-DD)

  € 1,826,250 Total Cost

  Description

The PI proposes to study a variety of open problems involving random planar maps and trees. This is a booming field at the intersection of probability, geometry, statistical physics, combinatorics and complex analysis. It has grown tremendously in the last two decades, in depth and breadth, and has seen breakthroughs on long-standing classical problems. The PI's first goal is to study the universality of embedded random planar maps and prove their convergence to what is known as Liouville quantum gravity, a class of random surfaces predicted by physicists to be the universal limit to such discrete random surfaces. Various map embedding mechanisms will be studied such as harmonic embedding, square-tiling, circle packing and others. The second goal is to solve problems concerning stochastic processes (such as random walks, percolation and the Ising model) on embedded random planar maps. This will shed light on the behavior of the same stochastic processes on regular lattices (such as the square or triangular grids) due to the non-rigorous Knizhnik-Polyakov-Zamolodchikov correspondence, a conjectural formula from the physics literature relating the behavior of critical statistical physics models on random lattices to their behavior on regular lattices. We will gain progress on these inspiring yet non-rigorous predictions by developing various probabilistic, geometric and complex analytic tools aimed to show that instabilities in the embeddings cancel out due to the randomness of the planar maps. This project has the potential to lead to the solution of the most central problems in two-dimensional statistical physics, such as estimating the typical displacement of the self-avoiding walk, proving conformal invariance for critical percolation on the square lattice and many others.

  Complicit Organisations

1 Israeli organisation participates in UniversalMap.