Illustrated by Nathalie Wahl

The development of Floer theory in its early years can be seen as a parallel to the emergence of algebraic topology in the first half of the 20th century, going from counting invariants to homology groups, and beyond that to the construction of algebraic structures on these homology groups and their underlying chain complexes.  In continuing work that started in the latter part of the 20th century, algebraic topologists and homotopy theorists have developed deep methods for refining these constructions, motivated in large part by the application of understanding the classification of manifolds. The goal of this program is to relate these developments to Floer theory with the dual aims of (i) making progress in understanding symplectic and low-dimensional topology, and (ii) providing a new set of geometrically motivated questions in homotopy theory. 

The mathematics and physics around gauge theory have, since their first interaction in the mid 1970’s, prompted tremendous developments in both mathematics and physics.  Deep and fundamental tools in partial differential equations have been developed to provide rigorous foundations for the mathematical study of gauge theories.  This led to ongoing revolutions in the understanding of manifolds of dimensions 3 and 4 and presaged the development of symplectic topology.  Ideas from quantum field theory have provided deep insights into new directions and conjectures on the structure of gauge theories and suggested many potential applications.  The focus of this program will be those parts of gauge theory which hold promise for new applications to geometry and topology and require development of new analytic tools for their study.