1-2-3 Seminar is a student-ran seminar at the University of Washington that takes place every winter and spring quarter. This seminar is a place where we talk about topics near and dear to ourselves, geared towards engaging audiences that are graduate students across different fields. The format of each talk will be three examples in increasing complexity (1-2-3), presented with an emphasis on quality and engagement.
For the year 2025-2026, the 1-2-3 Seminar is organized by Zawad Chowdhury (zawadx@uw.edu) and Mallory Dolorfino (mallod2@uw.edu). If you would like the opportunity to present, please contact us!
Subscribe to the 1-2-3 mailing list to get notifications!
For speakers: we encourage you to choose any topic of math for your talk! There are only two requirements for your 50-minute talk:
Your talk should be formatted around three examples of increasing complexity (1-2-3). Theorems are not considered examples!
Your talk should be accessible to graduate students in other fields. People with just a background from first-year courses should understand at least the first half of your talk.
Check out the previous years' schedule if you need ideas!
This year, we're adding an option for speakers to get feedback from the audience (through a form you opt into), as well as new challenges you can incorporate into your 1-2-3 talk (for speakers who would like a bit more of a... trial). Some possible challenges include:
5 levels: Give the same talk but at five levels of understanding (someone not into math, a high schooler, a math major, another math grad student and your advisor)
Pictionary: Only images in your slides
Socratic Method: The talk is delivered mostly by asking questions
Worksheet: Make a 12x-style worksheet for your talk
Taboo: Some terms are banned
Improv: Deliver a talk based on suggestions from the audience
Wedding Toast: Deliver a talk with stories, like a wedding toast
Time: Friday 3:30 - 4:30 pm (Different from before!!)
Location: Padelford C401 and on Zoom
Zoom Link: https://washington.zoom.us/j/92009646144
Note: the Zoom is open to all, but the recording requires an UW sign-in and expire 3 months after the date of the each talk. If you are outside of UW and would like to access to the recording please email us.
Speaker: Wolfgang Allred
Title: Equivariance for deranged
Abstract: Have you ever wondered what the hell a G-equivariant sheaf is? If so, then you're in good company. Drop by this Friday and we will explore equivariance together.
Speaker: Bryan Lu
Abstract: It has been said by many a combinatorialist that Y**ng d**gr*ms and Y**ng t*bl***x are intimately connected to the representation theory of the symmetric group. Indeed, (semi-)standard Y**ng t*bl***x index many interesting objects in the ring of characters of the symmetric group (read: ring of symmetric functions), but how do you use them to work with the actual representations themselves? We will explore at least three interesting ways that Y**ng d**gr*ms and Y**ng t*bl***x can be used to describe the irreducible representations of the symmetric group. Unfortunately, I have been cursed with the Taboo condition, so I will be incapable of saying some of the above words out loud...
Speaker: Micheal Zeng
Abstract: (This talk will be given as a Socratic Seminar.)
- How many roots does a polynomial have over the complex numbers? How about over the reals? Over any field?
- How many circles are simultaneously tangent to 3 circles in the plane, over C? How about over R? Over k?
- How many lines simultaneously meet 4 skew lines in 3-space?
- How many lines are there on a smooth cubic surface in 3-space? How many different types of lines are there?
- How many lines are there in a pencil of quartic surfaces in 3-space? What are the types of these lines?
- How many genus 1 curves are there on a (3,3)-Calabi-Yau threefold in 5-space?
- How do we know for sure???
Speaker: Ting Gong
Abstract: I will provide a worksheet about Brauer groups and we will work on it and talk about it. Depending on your level of knowledge you can pick what problems to solve but there are always problems to solve regardless of your knowledge.
Speaker: Haocheng Cai
Title: Measuring singularities in char 0 and p via "thresholds"
Abstract: Attach a real number to a mathematical object. If we are careful, we can get an "if and only if" statement of a property of the object in terms of whether a certain threshold value is reached. e.g. attach a number representing the effort spent and find a threshold value for completion of the PhD. The thresholds vary for different p (person/ characteristic). We will investigate two thresholds for singularities, log canonical threshold in characteristic 0 and F-pure threshold in prime characteristic p. We will use them to rate the badness of the singularities of a polynomial or an ideal, and compute some examples.
Speaker: Jay Reiter
Title: TBA
Abstract: TBA
Speaker: Alex Wang
Title: TBA
Abstract: TBA