TIME: 1:30-2:20 pm,  February 26, 2008

PLACE: CSE 503  

SPEAKER: Yuval Peres
         Microsoft Research

TITLE: Maximum Overhang

ABSTRACT:
How far can a stack of n identical blocks be made to hang over the edge of
a table? The question dates back to at least the middle of the 19th century
and the answer to it was widely believed to be of order log n. Recently,
Paterson and Zwick constructed n-block stacks with overhangs of order
n^{1/3}, exponentially better than previously thought possible. We show
here that order n^{1/3} is indeed best possible, resolving the long-standing
overhang problem up to a constant factor.  I will also present some related
open problems concerning a black cat jumping in a dark lattice.

Joint work with Mike Paterson, Mikkel Thorup, Peter Winkler, Uri Zwick