DEPARTMENT COLLOQUIUM
November 20, 2002

  Andrei Okounkov
Princeton University

The amoeba of a plane complex curve is its image in the real plane under the map that takes coordinates to the logarithms of their absolute values. The dimer model on a planar graph is the study of all perfect matchings (that is, ways to partition all vertices into pairs of neighbors) on that graph. The dimer model has a long history in both mathematics and physics. In this talk, based on joint work with Richard Kenyon and Scott Scheffield, I will explain how to see amoebas in dimers.