Section: Highlights of the Year

Highlights of the Year

Workshop METAMATH

This event marked the end of the project METAMATH,

funded by the French National Research Agency (ANR). The METAMATH project, led by Sonia Fliss, involved:

- from POEMS, Sonia Fliss, Anne-Sophie Bonnet Ben Dhia, Patrick Ciarlet, Patrick Joly, Camille Carvalho and Valentin Vinoles;

- from DEFI, Lucas Chesnel, Houssem Haddar, Mathieu Chamaillard and Thi Phong Nguyen;

- from Laboratoire Jacques Louis Lions, Xavier Claeys ;

- from IMATH, Université de Toulon, Guy Bouchitté and Christophe Bourel.

The motivation of this project was to contribute to the development of mathematical models for the study of periodic media and metamaterials, which are both physically relevant and available for numerical computations.

The aim of the workshop was to bring together physicists and mathematicians to make an overview of the recent researches and the new perspectives on the field.

The colloquium has taken place at Institut d’études scientifiques de Cargese, near Ajaccio, at Corsica from November 23rd until November 25th. There were about 40 participants.

Workshop on Mathematical and Numerical Modeling in Optics

This workshop, co-organized by Anne-Sophie Bonnet-Ben Dhia, was a part of the yearlong IMA (Institute of Mathematics and Applications) program in Mathematics and Optics, which brings together applied mathematicians, physical scientists and engineers to confront challenging problems arising in optics. It has taken place in Minneapolis from December 12th to December 16th.

It concerned more specifically researchers interested in the mathematical and numerical modeling of optical phenomena, especially spectral problems arising in photonics involving dispersion relations and band structures, eigenfunctions, and scattering resonances. Specific areas of focus included: (i) efficient computational methods for scattering and spectral problems and (ii) properties and optimal design of extreme materials and photonic devices. These problems arise in the study of photonic crystals and periodic media, diffraction gratings, metamaterials, graphene and related materials with Dirac points, and cloaking devices.

There were about 70 participants.