Special Colloquium
Benjamin Antieau
University of Washington
Division algebras and and classifying spaces of complex algebraic groups
Abstract: I will give a basic introduction to principal bundles over different kinds of spaces, and I will discuss the various spaces that classify these bundles. A key insight is that even topologically these bundles can be classified by maps to complex algebraic varieties. I will discuss how an approach to these algebraic classifying spaces, due to Totaro, led Ben Williams and myself to a method for answering concrete questions about division algebras over fields, and I will explain how these ideas resulted in our answer to a question in algebra from 1960.
Meet and greet at 4pm
Thursday February 20, 2014 at 3:00 PM in SEO 636