Tag: Colloquium
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PICS Colloquium with Boran Ma: AI for Sustainability & Sustainability in AI: a Closed-Loop Design Approach for Polymer Innovation
Abstract: Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) have contributed tremendously to the advances of materials science in recent years, from property prediction to structure design. High-throughput experimentation, enabled by AI/ML, further offers a reliable route to curating high-quality data for ML model training. Combining AI/ML with high-throughput experimentation, this talk will present a closed-loop…
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PICS Colloquium with Xianqiao Wang: Decoding Living Systems with AI and Computational Models: From Brain Development to Nano–Bio Interfaces
Abstract: Biomechanics must confront the inherent complexity of living systems and the limited ability of experiments alone to capture phenomena across scales. AI- and data-empowered computational mechanics offer powerful ways to bridge gaps in spatial and temporal resolution, generate predictive insight, and guide biomaterial design, disease diagnosis, and therapeutic strategies. This seminar illustrates how computational…
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PICS Colloquium with Anil Hirani and Christopher Eldred
This will be a joint colloquium, with two speakers, each with a 30 minute time slot. Anil Hirani Abstract: TBA Anil Hirani Bio: I am a Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I did my Ph.D. in Computer Science with minors in Mathematics and Control and Dynamical Systems at Caltech and M.S. in…
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PICS Colloquium with David Schwab: “Out-of-distribution generalization in context”
Abstract: In-context learning (ICL) is an emergent capability of pretrained transformers that allows models to generalize to previously unseen tasks after seeing only a few examples. We investigate empirically the conditions necessary on the pretraining distribution for ICL to emerge and generalize out-of-distribution. We find that as task diversity increases, transformers undergo a transition from…
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PICS Colloquium with Omar Valsson: From Stability to Dissociation: Elucidating Unbinding Kinetics of Protein-Protein Complexes via Atomistic Simulations
Abstract: Protein-protein interactions (PPI) are ubiquitous in biological processes. Their study has significant implications for drug discovery as PPIs are important pharmacological targets for small molecules and important in various therapeutic modalities, such as targeted protein degradation and antibodies. Therefore, understanding the stability and dissociation of protein-protein complexes is of great fundamental and practical interest.…
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PICS Colloquium with Grace Gu: AI-enabled design and manufacturing for multifunctional aerospace systems
Abstract: Future aerospace platforms, from aerial systems and spacecraft, need to meet rising demands for acoustic and electromagnetic interference (EMI) mitigation, operation in harsh environments, and payload maximization, all while reducing mass. In this talk, we will discuss our work addressing some of these challenges by uniting biological design principles with machine intelligence to create…
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PICS Colloquium: Modelling active matter on large length and time scales
Abstract: Active matter consists of particles that do work on their environment, for example by propelling themselves through a solvent. Fluids made from many interacting self-propelled particles have become popular as models of non-equilibrium matter: they are challenging for theory and computation because heir steady states cannot be derived by minimizing a free energy, nor…
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PICS Colloquium with Clarence Rowley: Learning parsimonious models by covariance balancing
Abstract: Data-driven reduced-order models often struggle with high-dimensional nonlinear systems sensitive to low-variance coordinates, which are typically truncated. To address this, we use ideas from balanced truncation and active subspaces to identify low-dimensional coordinate systems that balance adjoint-based sensitivity information with state variance along trajectories. Our method, analogous to balanced truncation, replaces system Gramians with…
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![PICS Colloquium: Macroscopic stochastic thermodynamics with Massimiliano Esposito [VIRTUAL]](https://pics.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/NTAwMDE3NTlfX01hc3NpbWlsaWFubyBFU1BPU0lUTw-scaled.jpg)
PICS Colloquium: Macroscopic stochastic thermodynamics with Massimiliano Esposito [VIRTUAL]
This speaker event is virtual, but will be screened in PICS 534 with refreshments. Abstract: Equilibrium thermodynamics emerges from equilibrium statistical mechanics as the most likely behavior of a system in the macroscopic limit. Over the last two decades, significant progress has been made in formulating statistical mechanics for small systems operating far-from-equilibrium. The resulting…
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PICS Colloquium: Flow and heat transfer over rough walls: fundamental physics, numerical simulations, and bulk parametrizations with Elie Bou-Zeid
Abstract: Understanding the physical processes modulating the transport of scalars, such as heat, over very rough surfaces is essential for understanding the thermal environment of cities, how wind and solar farms modify heat and water exchanges between the atmosphere and Earth surface, and parameterizing surface physics in coarser Earth systems models. This talk examines this…