- Series
- School of Mathematics Colloquium
- Time
- Thursday, September 10, 2026 - 11:00am for 1 hour (actually 50 minutes)
- Location
- Skiles 005
- Speaker
- John Etnyre – Georgia Tech – https://etnyre.math.gatech.edu
- Organizer
- Harold Blum
Contact geometry has a long history, with connections to many areas of physics and mathematics. I will begin with some history and motivation for contact geometry. I will then discuss the development of contact geometry in dimension three, and the central role knot theory has played in that development. We will end by considering the beautiful structure of special knots in contact manifolds and their use in classifying contact structures on three-manifolds.