Abstracts of Workshops
Hansjörg Geiges, University of Cologne
Contact 3-Manifolds and Geometric Topology
I shall survey the status of various classification questions in 3-dimensional contact topology, describe structure theorems for contact 3-manifolds, and discuss applications of these results to geometric topology.
Geiges Workshop Notes (PDF)
Katrin Wehrheim, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Introduction to Floer Theory for Lagrangian Submanifolds
I will introduce the (symplectic) Floer homology for pairs of Lagrangian submanifolds. It is invariant under Hamiltonian diffeomorphisms and provides bounds on the number of intersection points. In a special case, Floer introduced this invariant to prove the Arnold conjecture. It is based on counts of holomorphic strips with boundary values in the Lagrangian submanifolds. I will point out the essential obstructions and analytic difficulties and give the easiest sufficient conditions (on compactness, monotonicity, and Maslov index) under which the theory is well defined.
Wehrheim Workshop Notes (PDF)