Lecture Event
Moduli spaces in the eyes of a topologist: Mumford's
conjecture and
beyond
Ulrike Tillmann
5 Dec 2007, 17:15
Moduli spaces were first studied by Riemann, and have
been a
central object of mathematical study ever since. 25 years ago
Mumford initiated the systematic study of its topology. In this
lecture I
will review some background and explain how a fusion of
ideas from conformal field theory and algebraic topology led to
the proof of
Mumford's conjecture on the stable cohomology of moduli spaces.
The methods
of proof have been generalised yielding new exciting
applications in higher and lower dimensions.