Mathematics and Statistics Professor Thomas Barthelmé has earned an Alliance International grant from the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).
provides support for researchers in Canada to work with leading international researchers from the academic sector, and to establish and grow international research collaborations and projects that have a high potential for impact in natural sciences and engineering disciplines.
Dr. Barthelmé is the principal investigator for the Canadian portion of the grant, titled Anosov Dynamics, working in collaboration with a team of French mathematicians funded by the Agence Nationale de la Recherche.
“It’s important to celebrate and acknowledge the significant contribution Dr. Barthelmé is making to the university and our community,” says Sharon Regan, Acting Associate Dean (Research). “I congratulate him on this significant professional and personal honour and look forward to seeing where his academic career takes him in the future.”
The team consists of 10 senior members as well as eight PhDs/postdoctoral fellows. They are currently in the process of recruiting additional PhDs and postdoctoral fellows, thanks to this grant. The team has three groups, each with one scientific leader including Dr. Pierre Dehornoy (Aix-Marseille University), Dr. François Béguin (Paris Nord Sorbonne), and Dr. Barthelmé at Queen’s.
Dr. Barthelmé studies dynamical systems, which is the qualitative study of systems that evolve over time.
“Qualitative here is important: we are interested in what kind of long-term behavior a system has. For instance, the kind of questions we ask include: Are there periodic orbits? Are there a lot of them? Are there orbits that go "everywhere"? The quantitative side of this story is the field of differential equations, where they want to find specific solutions – in other words to describe specific orbits.”
More specifically, he studies hyperbolic systems. These are the systems that exhibit chaotic behavior, popularized as having the "butterfly effect", two orbits that start arbitrarily close will have large differences in their long-term behavior.
“So dynamical systems in general, and hyperbolic dynamical systems in particular, appear in a lot of problems studied in different sciences,” he explains. “However, I am a theoretical mathematician, so my focus is not on applications, but instead on trying to understand better hyperbolic systems in 3-dimensions.”
Getting a better understanding of hyperbolic systems is in fact the aim of the international project. More precisely, the Anosov Dynamics team, aims to solve some of the current and most pressing questions regarding Anosov and pseudo-Anosov flows in 3 dimensions, which are the prototypical example of chaotic dynamics. These flows in 3 dimensions, in particular, are at the nexus of several different mathematical fields.
Dr. Barthelmé joined the Mathematics and Statistics Department in 2016 after earning his Master’s and PhD from the Université de Strasbourg.
Dr. Barthelmé has high praise for the department, his colleagues, and his students, which is one of the main reasons he decided to apply for his position and why he has chosen to stay at Queen’s since 2016.
“The Mathematics and Statistics Department is recognized nationally and internationally as a strong research department, with many colleagues doing excellent research. Moreover, it is a friendly department, with a good atmosphere between colleagues and we all work very well together. This kind of working atmosphere is not a given in academia (or anywhere), so I really appreciate that.”
In addition to leading cutting-edge research, Dr. Barthelmé enjoys teaching and supporting the student experience at Queen’s.
“We are lucky to have exceptional students at ľĹĐăÖ±˛Ą, and many students are really interested in math, either in our math majors, or in the MathEng program,” Dr. BarthelmĂ© says. “Teaching and discussing my work and the work of my colleagues with these students is always a pleasure.”
When asked about how this award impacts him personally, Dr. Barthelmé says it allows him to formalize the connections he has with colleagues in France and hopes it will strengthen the relationships in his field between Canada and France.
"I have written several papers with French co-authors, as well as organized/participated in many conferences in France, but this grant will allow me to do more and hopefully create a long-lasting relationship between people (postdocs and PhD students) here and my colleagues in France.”