MIT CDO Events
Upcoming Seminars
The MIT Center for Computational Engineering (CCE) hosts a series of Seminars in Computational Engineering presented by distinguished speakers in fields relevant to the program. All seminars take place from 4:00-5:00 p.m. in Room 1-390.
Please visit the Previous Seminars page to view streaming videos of seminars from past years.
2009-2010 Distinguished Speaker Series
Wednesday, September 16, 2009:
Jeffrey Grossman, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, MIT
Topic: Nanomaterials for Energy Conversion and Storage: Insight from Theoretical Calculations
Abstract: Materials for energy conversion and storage can be greatly improved by taking advantage of unique effects that occur at the nanoscale. In our work, we develop and apply classical and quantum mechanical calculations to predict key properties that govern the conversion and storage efficiencies in these materials, including structural and electronic effects, interfacial charge separation, excited state phenomena, band level alignment, confinement effects, reaction pathway energetics, and novel synthesis approaches. An overview of our work will be presented, with examples in solar photovoltaics, thermoelectrics, hydrogen storage, and solar fuels. We use these examples to illustrate how computational approaches can improve our understanding and lead to more efficient materials and ultimately devices.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009:
Jay Gopalakrishnan, Department of Mathematics, University of Florida
Topic: New Discontinuous Petrov-Galerkin Techniques for Designing Numerical Schemes
Abstract: Finite element methods of the Petrov-Galerkin type have different trial and test spaces. While approximate solutions lie in the trial spaces, the equations are satisfied weakly up to the test spaces. Asserting a general principle that although one must choose trial spaces with good approximation properties, one may pick test spaces solely for stability properties, I will exemplify it by designing specific novel schemes. The presentation will be largely focused on our initial studies for the transport equations. But the potential for applying the technique in greater generality will be conveyed.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009:
Andreas Wächter, Mathematical Sciences Department, T.J. Watson Research Center, IBM
Topic: Large-Scale Nonlinear Optimization
Abstract: In this talk, we present an algorithm for nonlinear continuous optimization which uses a primal-dual interior point approach to facilitate the handling of up to millions of equality and inequality constraints. A filter line-search method ensures convergence to local solutions of the optimization problem (under standard assumptions). This algorithm has been implemented as the open source software package Ipopt and has been used to solve a number of real-life industrial and scientific applications. Some recent improvements will be discussed, such as the adaption of the method for the use of iterative linear solvers (e.g., for the solution of 3D PDE constrained optimization problems), as well as a distributed memory implementation for massively parallel computing environments.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009:
Ju Li, Material Theories Group, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Pennsylvania
Topic: Plumber’s Wonderland Found on Graphene
Abstract: Curvy nanostructures such as carbon nanotubes and fullerenes have extraordinary properties but are difficult to pick up, handle and assemble into devices after synthesis. We have performed experimental and modeling research into how to construct curvy nanostructures directly integrated on graphene, taking advantage of the fact that graphene, an atomically thin two-dimensional sheet, bends easily after open edges have been cut on it, which can then fuse with other open edges, like a plumber connecting metal fittings. By applying electrical current heating to few-layer graphene inside an electron microscope, we observed the in situ creation of many interconnected, curved carbon nanostructures, such as graphene bilayer edges (BLEs), aka “fractional nanotubes;” BLE polygons equivalent to “squashed fullerenes” and “anti quantum-dots;” and nanotube-BLE junctions connecting multiple layers of graphene. Further theoretical research has indicated that multiple-layer graphene offers unique opportunities for tailoring carbon-based structures and engineering novel nano-devices with complex topologies.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010:
Max Gunzburger, Department of Scientific Computing, Florida State University
Topic: Color Printers, Mailboxes, Fish, Climate Change, and Homer Simpson or Centroidal Voronoi Tessellations: Algorithms and Applications
Wednesday, March 10, 2010:
Adri Van Duin, Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering, Pennsylvania State University
Topic: Development and application of the ReaxFF Reactive Force Field
in Atomistic-scale Simulations on Combustion, Catalysis and Material Failure
Wednesday, April 7, 2010:
Bertrand Maury, Laboratoire de Mathématiques, Université Paris-Sud
Topic: Micro and Macro Models of Gradient-flow Type for Crowd Motion in Emergency Situations
Wednesday, May 5, 2010:
Omar Ghattas, Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences, University of Texas at Austin
Topic: Stochastic Newton Methods for Statistical Inverse Problems
About the CDO Distinguished Speaker Series
The CCE seminar series is free and open to the public. Please return to this page periodically for the most up-to-date seminar information, or check the MIT Events Calendar for details.
This series is sponsored by the MIT Center for Computational Engineering and the Singapore-MIT Alliance.
