{"id":2978,"date":"2026-09-10T13:43:56","date_gmt":"2026-09-10T17:43:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/?page_id=2978"},"modified":"2026-09-10T13:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-10T17:44:09","slug":"the-2026-annual-richard-w-sampson-lecture","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/the-2026-annual-richard-w-sampson-lecture\/","title":{"rendered":"The 2026 Annual Richard W. Sampson Lecture"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><strong>Elizabeth Bradley<\/strong>, Professor of Computer Science<\/strong> at The University of Colorado Boulder<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/files\/2026\/09\/Radcliffe-mugshot.webp\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"133\" height=\"199\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/files\/2026\/09\/Radcliffe-mugshot.webp\" alt=\"Photo of Professor Elizabeth Bradley\" class=\"wp-image-2979\" style=\"width:240px;height:auto\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">General Audience Talk: <em>A Brief Tour of Chaos Theory<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<h6 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Wednesday, 09\/30 @7:00 pm, Pettengil<\/span><\/strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">l Hall G65<\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Abstract:<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Dynamical chaos is ubiquitous across a broad range of natural and engineered systems &#8212; and even a few movie scripts.\u00a0 Chaotic systems are exquisitely sensitive to small perturbations, but their behavior has a fixed and highly characteristic pattern.\u00a0 Making sense of this fascinating and somewhat counterintuitive combination of effects is important to one&#8217;s ability to understand the physical world.\u00a0 I will begin this talk with a (very gentle) review of the core ideas of nonlinear dynamics, mostly in the form of pictures, and then talk about about some fun examples, ranging from paleoclimate dynamics to music and dance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Afternoon Talk: <em>Computational Topology Techniques for Characterizing Time Series Data<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<h6 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Thursday, 10\/01 @ 12:00 pm, Dana 204<\/strong><\/span><\/h6>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Abstract:<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The first step in computing the state-space topology of a dynamical system from scalar data requires accurate reconstruction of those dynamics using delay-coordinate embedding; the second is the construction of an appropriate simplicial complex from the results. The first of these steps involves a number of free parameters, though, and the computation of homology for a large number of simplices can be expensive. I will discuss some approaches for computing the homology efficiently and effectively, in the face of these challenges, using a range of examples from the classic Lorenz system through musical instruments and honeybee colonies to demonstrate the associated ideas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\"><em><strong>Accessibility:<\/strong>&nbsp;Bates is committed to creating inclusive and accessible events. If you need a reasonable accommodation, please contact Peter Philbin (pphilbin@bates.edu). All requests should be made 5 business days prior to the event to aid ability to meet your needs.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elizabeth Bradley, Professor of Computer Science at The University of Colorado Boulder&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2012,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_batesModPostContentOverride_prepend":false,"_batesModPostContentOverride_append":false,"_batesModPostContentOverride_append_before_footer":false,"bates_author_byline_override":"","_hide_page_title":false,"_header_override":"","_template_width_override":"","_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"_sidebarChoice":"","footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"class_list":["post-2978","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2012"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2978"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2982,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2978\/revisions\/2982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/mathematics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}