Category Archives: Computer Science and Optimization

Cheerful News in Difficult Times: The Abel Prize is Awarded to László Lovász and Avi Wigderson

Posted on March 17, 2021 by Gil Kalai

The Abel Prize was awarded earlier today to László Lovász and Avi Wigderson “for their foundational contributions to theoretical computer science and discrete mathematics, and their leading role in shaping them into central fields of modern mathematics.” Congratulations to Laci … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Convexity, Geometry, Updates | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Amazing: Feng Pan and Pan Zhang Announced a Way to “Spoof” (Classically Simulate) the Google’s Quantum Supremacy Circuit!

Posted on March 10, 2021 by Gil Kalai

Feng Pan and Pan Zhang uploaded a new paper on the arXive  “Simulating the Sycamore supremacy circuits.” with an amazing announcement. Abstract: We propose a general tensor network method for simulating quantum circuits. The method is massively more efficient in … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer Science and Optimization, Physics, Quantum | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

And the Oscar goes to: Meir Feder, Zvi Reznic, Guy Dorman, and Ron Yogev

Posted on February 16, 2021 by Gil Kalai

My mother Carmela Kalai often said that if there was something she is thankful for it was that she was born in the era of movies. Indeed, she loved movies from a very early age throughout her life.  So, I … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer Science and Optimization, Information theory, Movies | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

To cheer you up in difficult times 19: Nati Linial and Adi Shraibman construct larger corner-free sets from better numbers-on-the-forehead protocols

Posted on February 3, 2021 by Gil Kalai

What will be the next polymath project? click here for our previous post.  Number on the forehead, communication complexity, and additive combinatorics Larger Corner-Free Sets from Better NOF Exactly-N Protocols, by Nati Linial and Adi Shraibman Abstract: A subset of … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Igor Pak: What if they are all wrong?

Posted on January 19, 2021 by Gil Kalai

Originally posted on Igor Pak's blog:
Conjectures are a staple of mathematics. They are everywhere, permeating every area, subarea and subsubarea. They are diverse enough to avoid a single general adjective. They come in al shapes and sizes. Some…

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Geometry, What is Mathematics | Tagged | 6 Comments

Open problem session of HUJI-COMBSEM: Problem #5, Gil Kalai – the 3ᵈ problem

Posted on January 10, 2021 by Gil Kalai

This post continues to describe problems presented at our open problems session back in November 2020. Here is the first post in the series.  Today’s problem was presented by me, and it was an old 1989 conjecture of mine. A … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Geometry, Open problems | 5 Comments

The Argument Against Quantum Computers – A Very Short Introduction

Posted on December 29, 2020 by Gil Kalai

Left: Gowers’s book Mathematics a very short introduction. Right C. elegans; Boson Sampling can be seen as the C. elegans of quantum computing. (See, this paper.) Update (January 6, 2021): Tomorrow January, 7, 8:30 AM Israel time, I give a … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Physics, Probability, Quantum | Tagged , | 7 Comments

To Cheer You Up in Difficult Times 15: Yuansi Chen Achieved a Major Breakthrough on Bourgain’s Slicing Problem and the Kannan, Lovász and Simonovits Conjecture

Posted on December 21, 2020 by Gil Kalai

This post gives some background to  a recent amazing breakthrough  paper: An Almost Constant Lower Bound of the Isoperimetric Coefficient in the KLS Conjecture by Yuansi Chen. Congratulations Yuansi! The news Yuansi Chen gave an almost constant bounds for Bourgain’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Convexity, Geometry | Tagged | 5 Comments

Open problem session of HUJI-COMBSEM: Problem #3, Ehud Friedgut – Independent sets and Lionel Levine’s infamous hat problem.

Posted on December 12, 2020 by Gil Kalai

Here are the two problems presented by Ehud Friedgut. The first arose by Friedgut, Kindler, and me in the context of studying  Lionel Levine’s infamous hat problem. The second is Lionel Levine’s infamous hat problem. Ehud Friedgut with a few … Continue reading →

Posted in Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Probability | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

To cheer you up in difficult times 4: Women In Theory present — I will survive

Posted on May 11, 2020 by Gil Kalai

An amazing video (Update, May18 2020). I failed to explain what WIT is and this may have caused some misunderstanding. Here is a description from the Simons Institute site. “The Women in Theory (WIT) Workshop is intended for graduate and … Continue reading →

Posted in Academics, Combinatorics, Computer Science and Optimization, Convexity, Games, Philosophy, Poetry, What is Mathematics, Women in science | 14 Comments