Student Probability Seminar

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Cutoff of Markov Chains through Curvature

Speaker: Owen Mireles Briones, Stony Brook

Location: Online

Date: Wednesday, May 5, 2021, 9 a.m.

Synopsis:

The analysis required to establish cutoff (a sharp phase transition between nonrandom and stationary) in Markov chains is more delicate than the one needed for the mixing time. Furthermore, even among the successful cases, identifying the general mechanisms behind cutoff remains one of the most fundamental open problems in the area of mixing times. In this talk, I will review a paper of Justin Salez, where cutoff for non-negatively curved Markov chains is proven.