Relativistic Fermions and Nodal Semimetals from Topology (18w5047)

The Banff International Research Station will host the " Relativistic Fermions and Nodal Semimetals from Topology" workshop from February 11th to February 16th, 2018.

Metals and insulators represent two key types of solids distinguished by their fundamental response to the applied electric field: metals conduct electricity while insulators do not. This workshop is concerned with properties of “semimetals”, materials that straddle the divide between metals and insulators. Significant new insights into our understanding of semimetals have been achieved in the recent years by combining ideas borrowed from the branch of mathematics known as topology, particle physics, and traditional condensed matter physics and material science. In fact new materials in his class discovered recently by material scientists realize unusual phenomena predicted long time ago by particle physicist, some of them never before observed. The purpose of this workshop is to bring together leading experts representing these disparate groups with the goal to exchange ideas and develop new ways to understand, classify and characterize these remarkable new materials, as well as find ways to discover new ones and exploit their properties in future technological applications.

The Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Innovation and Discovery (BIRS) is a collaborative Canada-US-Mexico venture that provides
an environment for creative interaction as well as the exchange of ideas, knowledge, and methods within the Mathematical Sciences, with related disc
iplines and with industry. The research station is located at The Banff Centre in Alberta and is supported by Canada's Natural Science and Engineeri
ng Research Council (NSERC), the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), Alberta's Advanced Education and Technology, and Mexico's Consejo Nacional
de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACYT).