Foams and minimal surfaces

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Programme theme

Computational methods have given fresh impetus to the mathematics of minimal surfaces and its applications. In particular the theory of liquid foams, which has its roots in the work of Plateau in the 19th century, has been greatly advanced. The Surface Evolver software developed by Ken Brakke and others has been particularly valuable. The subject remains a fertile ground for interaction between pure and applied mathematicians, physicists and engineers, using mathematical analysis and extensive simulations.

In addition to the further analysis of equilibrium foam structure, physical properties associated with coarsening, drainage, rheology and collapse are actively debated. These are of widespread industrial interest (detergents, foods and beverages, defoaming).

The programme will progress from the theory of minimal surfaces and discrete geometry to a wide range of techniques and applications, and will include related fields (emulsions, biophysics, solid foams).

Special Lectures

05 August 2002: 16:00 - 17:00: Professor T Hales (University of Pittsburgh) Connections between sphere packings and honeycombs
12 August 2002: 16:00 - 17:00: Professor MF Ashby (Department of Engineering, Cambridge) Novel Cellular structures and the design of sandwich panels
14 August 2002:: The Soap Bubble Geometry Contest - A public event for ages 11+
19 August 2002: 16:00 - 17:00: Professor Sir Sam Edwards (Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge) Granular materials need a new statistical mechanics

Click here to download the programme's final scientific report

Preprints

Title	Year	Programme
Dynamics of Structural Transformations between Lamellar and Inverse Bicontinuous Cubic Lyotropic Phases Authors: Richard Templer, FRSC Download PDF	2002	FMS
Kinetics and mechanism of the interconversion of inverse bicontinuous cubic mesophases Authors: Richard Templer, FRSC Download PDF	2002	FMS
Periodicity of cell pressures in periodic foams Authors: N Kern, Simon Cox, Denis Weaire Download PDF	2002	FMS

Title

Year

Programme

Dynamics of Structural Transformations between Lamellar and Inverse Bicontinuous Cubic Lyotropic Phases

Authors: Richard Templer, FRSC

Download PDF

2002

FMS

Kinetics and mechanism of the interconversion of inverse bicontinuous cubic mesophases

Authors: Richard Templer, FRSC

Download PDF

2002

FMS

Periodicity of cell pressures in periodic foams

Authors: N Kern, Simon Cox, Denis Weaire

Download PDF

2002

FMS

Workshops

FMSW01

Surface Evolver extravaganza

30 July 2002 to 30 July 2002

FMSW02

Foams and minimal surfaces - 12 years on

24 February 2014 to 28 February 2014

Seminars

Wednesday 31st July 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Open problems in soap bubble geometry	Room 2
12:00 to 12:30	Jean Taylor Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey Rotating crystals in foam	Room 2
15:45 to 16:30	Jean Taylor Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey Practical techniques for demonstrating soap film phenomena	Room 2

Thursday 1st August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Stephen Hyde Australian National University 2D tilings and 3D Euclidean patterns	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	Andrejs Cebers Experiments with ferrofluids	Room 2

Friday 2nd August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Thomas Hales University of Pittsburgh Honeycombs	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	Rob Kusner University of Massachusetts Forces in foams	Room 2

Monday 5th August 2002
14:15 to 14:50	Minkowski	Room 2
14:50 to 15:25	Christophe Oguey Deformations of minimal surfaces	Room 2
16:00 to 17:00	Thomas Hales University of Pittsburgh Connections between sphere packings and honeycombs	Room 2

Tuesday 6th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	3D coarsening	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	Andrew Kraynik Sandia National Laboratories The cross-over in 3D coarsening	Room 2

Wednesday 7th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Francois Graner Strain in foams and disordered patterns	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	James Glazier University of Notre Dame Experiments on 2D flowing foams	Room 2
14:00 to 15:00	Renaud Delannay Challenges in 2D	Room 2

Thursday 8th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Douglas Reinelt Southern Methodist University Deformation of ordered foams	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	Kwokyip Szeto Shell analysis of soap froth	Room 2
15:00 to 15:30	Andrejs Cebers Labyrinthine patterns	Room 2
15:30 to 16:00	Rob Kusner University of Massachusetts Rope packings	Room 2
16:00 to 16:30	Frank Morgan Williams College Perimeter-minimising planar bubble clusters	Room 2

Friday 9th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Nick Rivier University of Strasbourg Gauge invariance in foams	Room 2
11:45 to 12:15	Michael Monastyrsky ITEP (Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics) Phase transitions in membranes of high genus	Room 2

Monday 12th August 2002
13:45 to 14:15	Andrew Kraynik Sandia National Laboratories Elastic behaviour of open-celled solid foams	Room 2
14:15 to 14:50	Rafi Blumenfeld Imperial College London Theory for stress transmission in planar cellular networks: are these a new state of solid matter?	Room 2
14:50 to 15:10	Simon Cox Aberystwyth University Metallic foam formation	Room 2
15:10 to 15:30	Metal foam processing for fine cells: modelling and experimental observations	Room 2
16:00 to 17:00	Mike Ashby University of Cambridge Novel cellular structures and the design of sandwich panels	Room 2

Tuesday 13th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Pablo Padilla Unstable minimal surfaces: a PDE approach	Room 2
11:45 to 12:00	Michael Monastyrsky ITEP (Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics) Life and work of Riemann	Room 2

Wednesday 14th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Howard Stone Harvard University Foam drainage overview	Room 2
11:45 to 12:00	Simon Cox Aberystwyth University Drainage in a 3D world	Room 2
12:00 to 12:15	Stephan Koehler Harvard University Visualisation of local fluid dynamics in foam	Room 2
14:00 to 14:15	Stephen Neethling Imperial College London Drainage in a flotation tank	Room 2
14:15 to 14:30	Douglas Durian University of Pennsylvania Coarsening and consequences	Room 2

Thursday 15th August 2002
11:15 to 11:35	Michael Loewenberg Stanford University Including Marasgoni stresses in foam drainage	Room 2
11:35 to 11:55	Richard Charles Darton University of Oxford Foams that flow	Room 2
11:55 to 12:15	Elie Raphael Collège de France Marginal pinching is soap films	Room 2
14:15 to 14:30	Denis Weaire Trinity College Dublin Dilatancy	Room 2
14:45 to 15:30	Discussion of couplings (drainage \& rheology, drainage \& coarsening etc)	Room 2

Monday 19th August 2002
14:00 to 14:45	Andrea Jo-wei Liu Jamming	Room 1
14:45 to 15:30	Chris Petrie University of Newcastle upon Tyne Structure tensors \& rheology	Room 1
16:00 to 17:00	Sam Edwards University of Cambridge Granular materials need a new statistical mechanics	Room 1

Tuesday 20th August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Andrew Kraynik Sandia National Laboratories Elastic-plastic behaviour	Room 1
11:45 to 12:15	What is the constitutive law of aqueous foam?	Room 1

Wednesday 21st August 2002
11:15 to 11:45	Frank Morgan Williams College Instabilities	Room 1
11:45 to 12:15	Rob Kusner University of Massachusetts How much rope does it take to tie a knot?	Room 1
14:15 to 15:15	Kenneth Brakke Susquehanna University Evolver tutorial for advanced users	Room 1
16:00 to 16:30	Andrea Jo-wei Liu Effective temperature of sheared foam	Room 1

Thursday 22nd August 2002
11:15 to 12:15	Peter Sollich King's College London Tensorial soft glassy rheology	Room 1
14:15 to 14:45	Oliver Harlen University of Leeds Bubble growth in viscoelastic fluids	Room 1
14:45 to 15:15	Dov Levine Technion - Israel Institute of Technology Force chains	Room 1

Friday 23rd August 2002
11:15 to 12:25	Bell Session	Room 1

Monday 24th February 2014
08:30 to 09:20	Registration	No Room Required
09:20 to 09:30	Welcome from Christie Marr (INI Deputy Director)	Room 1
10:15 to 11:00	Particles and droplets in Foams - A simulation approach	Room 1
11:00 to 11:45	Morning Coffee	No Room Required
11:45 to 12:05	Analysis of a Model for Foam Improved Oil Recovery	Room 1
12:05 to 12:30	Foam flow in porous media	Room 1
12:30 to 13:30	Lunch at Wolfson Court	No Room Required
13:30 to 14:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
14:15 to 14:35	Flow of an aqueous foam through a two-dimensional porous medium: structure-dynamics couplings	Room 1
15:15 to 15:45	Afternoon Tea	No Room Required
15:45 to 16:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
17:00 to 18:00	Welcome Wine Reception sponsored by Oxford University Press	No Room Required

Tuesday 25th February 2014
09:30 to 10:15	Materials and Meromorphic Differentials	Room 1
11:00 to 11:45	Morning Coffee	No Room Required
12:30 to 13:30	Lunch at Wolfson Court	No Room Required
13:30 to 14:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
14:15 to 14:35	Periodic auxetics: a geometric approach	Room 1
14:35 to 14:55	Geometric flexibility in sodalite frameworks	Room 1
15:15 to 15:45	Afternoon Tea	No Room Required
15:45 to 16:15	Private Discussion	Room 1

Wednesday 26th February 2014
09:30 to 10:15	Boundary Singularities Produced by the Motion of Soap Films	Room 1
10:15 to 11:00	A multi-scale framework to model dry foam dynamics	Room 1
11:00 to 11:45	Morning Coffee	No Room Required
12:30 to 13:30	Lunch at Wolfson Court	No Room Required
13:30 to 14:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
14:15 to 14:35	Topological transformations in foams and liquid crystalline mesophases	Room 1
14:35 to 14:55	T1s in soap film architecture: effect of surfactants and assembly geometry	Room 1
15:15 to 15:45	Afternoon Tea	No Room Required
15:45 to 16:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
16:30 to 17:30	Informal discussion	Discussion Room
19:30 to 23:00	Conference Dinner at Emmanuel College	No Room Required

Thursday 27th February 2014
11:00 to 11:45	Morning Coffee	No Room Required
12:05 to 12:30	Periodic simple tilings as models for monodisperse foams	Room 1
12:30 to 13:30	Lunch at Wolfson Court	No Room Required
13:30 to 14:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
14:55 to 15:15	Plenary Discussion: Open problems in the geometry of bubble clusters	Room 1
15:15 to 15:45	Afternoon Tea	No Room Required
15:45 to 16:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
15:45 to 17:00	Informal discussion	Discussion Room

Friday 28th February 2014
09:30 to 10:15	Can bubble interactions in foams accurately be described by a potential?	Room 1
10:15 to 11:00	Gibbs elasticity effect in foam shear flows: a non quasi-static 2D numerical simulation	Room 1
11:00 to 11:45	Morning Coffee	No Room Required
12:30 to 13:30	Lunch at Wolfson Court	No Room Required
13:30 to 15:15	Private Discussion	Room 1
15:15 to 15:45	Afternoon Tea	No Room Required
15:45 to 17:00	Private Discussion	Room 1

Speakers

Mike Ashby University of Cambridge
Rafi Blumenfeld Imperial College London
Kenneth Brakke Susquehanna University
Andrejs Cebers
Simon Cox University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Richard Charles Darton University of Oxford
Renaud Delannay
Douglas Durian University of Pennsylvania
Sam Edwards University of Cambridge
James Glazier University of Notre Dame
Francois Graner
Thomas Hales University of Pittsburgh
Oliver Harlen University of Leeds
Stephen Hyde Australian National University
Stephan Koehler Harvard University
Andrew Kraynik Sandia National Laboratories
Rob Kusner University of Massachusetts
Dov Levine Technion - Israel Institute of Technology
Andrea Jo-wei Liu
Michael Loewenberg Stanford University
Michael Monastyrsky ITEP (Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics)
Frank Morgan Williams College
Stephen Neethling Imperial College London
Christophe Oguey
Pablo Padilla
Chris Petrie University of Newcastle upon Tyne
Elie Raphael Collège de France
Douglas Reinelt Southern Methodist University
Nick Rivier University of Strasbourg
Peter Sollich King's College London
Howard Stone Harvard University
Kwokyip Szeto
Jean Taylor Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
Denis Weaire Trinity College Dublin

Show All

Programme theme

Special Lectures

Preprints

Dynamics of Structural Transformations between Lamellar and Inverse Bicontinuous Cubic Lyotropic Phases

Kinetics and mechanism of the interconversion of inverse bicontinuous cubic mesophases

Periodicity of cell pressures in periodic foams

Workshops

Surface Evolver extravaganza

Foams and minimal surfaces - 12 years on

Seminars

Speakers

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