Closing Session of the SIJIMat Seminar: A Celebration of Young Mathematical Talent

Four young researchers (S. Dhyr, A. Garcia, L. Unamuno and R.Homs) at CRM present their work in geometry, neuroscience, environmental statistics, and algebraic methods in the final SIJIMat session of the academic year.

On June 12, the Centre de Recerca Matemàtica (CRM) hosted the closing session of the SIJIMat seminar, a space designed to foster interaction among early-career researchers at the center. This final event of the academic year was a celebration of emerging mathematical talent, featuring accessible presentations and a collaborative atmosphere.

Throughout the year, SIJIMat has provided a platform for PhD students and postdoctoral researchers to share their work in an engaging and interdisciplinary format. The closing session brought together four young researchers who presented brief talks on their current projects:

• Søren Dhyr, PhD student at the CRM, gave a visual introduction to cosymplectic geometry, a branch of mathematics that studies three-dimensional spaces built from stacked planes. By adding a metric, one can analyze how angles and lengths change when moving between these planes, leading to a notion of “energy” associated with the structure. Without assuming prior knowledge of differential geometry, Dhyr guided the audience through this geometric world and introduced a recent joint work with Ángel González-Prieto, Eva Miranda, and Daniel Peralta-Salas, which investigates when this energy is minimized.

• Alexandre Garcia, also a PhD student, explored the phenomenon of bistable perception, where a single stimulus can lead to two mutually exclusive interpretations. Although perception is a fundamental brain process, the mechanisms behind this bistability remain unclear. Alexandre presented a mathematical framework developed to study these mechanisms and explained how the team validates its predictions using experimental data.

• Leire Unamuno, research technician at the CRM, focused on the link between air pollution and mental health, particularly in children and adolescents. She presented an ongoing project that investigates this association across Catalonia, explaining the general idea behind the spatio-temporal model they use and how it is implemented. Her talk highlighted the intersection of statistics, environmental health, and social impact.

• Roser Homs, Beatriu de Pinós postdoctoral fellow, introduced the field of Algebraic Statistics, which applies tools from algebraic geometry, commutative algebra, combinatorics, and computational algebra to statistical problems. Her talk focused on graphical models—statistical models where a graph encodes dependencies among random variables. She showcased a range of applications, from reconstructing phylogenetic trees to causal discovery, and concluded by addressing a fundamental question: how much data is minimally required for reliable statistical inference?

The session was a vivid reflection of the diversity and dynamism of the CRM research community. Beyond the scientific content, it strengthened connections among researchers and celebrated the collaborative spirit that drives mathematical discovery.