MATH Seminar

Title: Norms of Roots of Trinomials
Seminar: Algebra
Speaker: Timo de Wolff of Texas A&M
Contact: Vicki Powers, vicki@mathcs.emory.edu
Date: 2015-10-06 at 4:00PM
Venue: W304
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Abstract: The behavior of norms of roots of univariate trinomials with respect to the choice of coefficients is a classical late 19th and early 20th century problem. In 1908, P. Bohl characterized the parameter space, but only in an algebraic way. By using amoeba theory we uncover a beautiful geometric and topological structure in the corresponding parameter space. More precisely, we show that norms of roots of trinomials are geometrically characterized by hypo-epitrochoids and its parameter space is topologically characterized by torus knots.