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Contemporary research in biology is increasingly becoming more quantitative in nature. As such, "...we are drowning in a sea of data and thirsting for some theoretical framework with which to understand it" [Brenner (2012)]. The absence of meaningful exchanges between experimentalists and theoreticians is a glaring reason for this state of affairs. The broad aim of the second edition of "Thirsting for theoretical biology" is to expose people who have a background in the physical and mathematical sciences to a range of interesting biological phenomena at the cellular and tissue level as experimentalists view them. The meeting will showcase examples of theory-experiment interactions that can deepen our understanding of living matter and will also feature a panel discussion titled 'What is theoretical biology?'. In addition, there will be a discussion, aimed mainly at students, on why theoretical and quantitative biology offers exciting prospects for a research career. The topics to be co...

Contemporary research in biology is increasingly becoming more quantitative in nature. As such, "...we are drowning in a sea of data and thirsting for some theoretical framework with which to understand it" [Brenner (2012)]. The absence of meaningful exchanges between experimentalists and theoreticians is a glaring reason for this state of affairs. The broad aim of the second edition of "Thirsting for theoretical biology" is to expose people who have a background in the physical and mathematical sciences to a range of interesting biological phenomena at the cellular and tissue level as experimentalists view them. The meeting will showcase examples of theory-experiment interactions that can deepen our understanding of living matter and will also feature a panel discussion titled 'What is theoretical biology?'. In addition, there will be a discussion, aimed mainly at students, on why theoretical and quantitative biology offers exciting prospects for a research career. The topics to be co...

This program aims to bring together experts in several interconnected themes in modern probability theory that can broadly be brought under the umbrella of high dimensional probability. The specific areas of emphasis will be the following:Random matrices and random operatorsGeometric functional analysis and high dimensional convex geometryPoint processes and interacting particle systemsSpin glasses and Gaussian free fields.These interconnected topics have seen a burst of activity in recent years in connection with different branches of mathematics such as dynamical systems and geometry as well as other disciplines such as mathematical physics and data sciences. Apart from the research talks by invited speakers, there will be two minicourses, aimed at graduate students/junior researchers, of four one hour lectures each, given by :Mark Rudelson (University of Michigan)Anton Bovier (Univarsität Bonn)This program will also include an Infosys-ICTS Ramanujan lecture series by Hugo Dominil-Co...

Applied probability has seen a revolutionary growth in research activity, driven by the information age and exploding technological frontiers. Applications include the internet and the world wide web, social networks, integrated supply chains in manufacturing networks, the highly intertwined international economies, and so on. The common thread running through these is that they are large interconnected systems that are emergent with very little top down design to optimize them. Probabilistic methods with limit theorems as their mainstay are best suited to find structure and regularity to help model, analyze and optimize such systems. Interface of probability with learning theory, optimization and control, and statistics has been the driving force behind the emerging paradigms, techniques and mathematics to address the huge scale of problems seen in such technological and commercial applications, not to mention several in biological or physical systems. In this six day program on advan...

This program aims to bring together experts in several interconnected themes in modern probability theory that can broadly be brought under the umbrella of high dimensional probability. The specific areas of emphasis will be the following:Random matrices and random operatorsGeometric functional analysis and high dimensional convex geometryPoint processes and interacting particle systemsSpin glasses and Gaussian free fields.These interconnected topics have seen a burst of activity in recent years in connection with different branches of mathematics such as dynamical systems and geometry as well as other disciplines such as mathematical physics and data sciences. Apart from the research talks by invited speakers, there will be two minicourses, aimed at graduate students/junior researchers, of four one hour lectures each, given by :Mark Rudelson (University of Michigan)Anton Bovier (Univarsität Bonn)This program will also include an Infosys-ICTS Ramanujan lecture series by Hugo Dominil-Co...

Applied probability has seen a revolutionary growth in research activity, driven by the information age and exploding technological frontiers. Applications include the internet and the world wide web, social networks, integrated supply chains in manufacturing networks, the highly intertwined international economies, and so on. The common thread running through these is that they are large interconnected systems that are emergent with very little top down design to optimize them. Probabilistic methods with limit theorems as their mainstay are best suited to find structure and regularity to help model, analyze and optimize such systems. Interface of probability with learning theory, optimization and control, and statistics has been the driving force behind the emerging paradigms, techniques and mathematics to address the huge scale of problems seen in such technological and commercial applications, not to mention several in biological or physical systems. In this six day program on advan...

'Fluctuation-and-noise' are themes that are common in the study of living systems, starting from molecular and cellular levels to higher levels of biological organization. Interestingly, instead of suppressing or filtering out the noise, a cell often exploits it to drive many of its intracellular and extracellular processes. Some of these noise-exploiting processes are essential for the survival of the cell, while some others occur in anticipation, essentially to enable the cell to overcome adverse conditions in future. Not surprisingly, concepts and techniques of statistical physics, particularly those drawn from stochastic thermodynamics, kinetics, non-equilibrium statistical mechanics and nonlinear dynamics, have been used very effectively in recent decades, to unveil many mysteries of stochastic processes that are associated with 'life'.The ICTS program 'Statistical Biological Physics: From Single Molecule to Cell' intends to bring statistical physicists, molecular cell biologists,...

The interest in turbulent flow goes back many centuries, but progress has been very slow until recently, from the  point of view of ab initio theory (starting from the Euler or Navier-Stokes equations). In the 20th century, innumerable applications,  e.g., in aeronautics or atmospheric and oceanic circulation, have been a major driving force for progress. In the last eighty years,  thanks (a) to the scaling predictions of Kolmogorov in 1941 (K41), (b) to Onsager's 1949 (Ons49) criterion for anomalous energy dissipation, and (c) to Kraichnan's discovery of  the inverse energy cascade for 2D turbulence, we have had the beginnings of a theoretical understanding. Furthermore, from experiments and numerical simulations of the last forty years, it is now clear that simple K41 scale invariance is broken and that a turbulent fluid displays multifractal scaling, which has been modelled by using various ad hoc probabilistic models, so far not deduced from the hydrodynamical equations. Recently, ...

'Fluctuation-and-noise' are themes that are common in the study of living systems, starting from molecular and cellular levels to higher levels of biological organization. Interestingly, instead of suppressing or filtering out the noise, a cell often exploits it to drive many of its intracellular and extracellular processes. Some of these noise-exploiting processes are essential for the survival of the cell, while some others occur in anticipation, essentially to enable the cell to overcome adverse conditions in future. Not surprisingly, concepts and techniques of statistical physics, particularly those drawn from stochastic thermodynamics, kinetics, non-equilibrium statistical mechanics and nonlinear dynamics, have been used very effectively in recent decades, to unveil many mysteries of stochastic processes that are associated with 'life'.The ICTS program 'Statistical Biological Physics: From Single Molecule to Cell' intends to bring statistical physicists, molecular cell biologists,...

The interest in turbulent flow goes back many centuries, but progress has been very slow until recently, from the  point of view of ab initio theory (starting from the Euler or Navier-Stokes equations). In the 20th century, innumerable applications,  e.g., in aeronautics or atmospheric and oceanic circulation, have been a major driving force for progress. In the last eighty years,  thanks (a) to the scaling predictions of Kolmogorov in 1941 (K41), (b) to Onsager's 1949 (Ons49) criterion for anomalous energy dissipation, and (c) to Kraichnan's discovery of  the inverse energy cascade for 2D turbulence, we have had the beginnings of a theoretical understanding. Furthermore, from experiments and numerical simulations of the last forty years, it is now clear that simple K41 scale invariance is broken and that a turbulent fluid displays multifractal scaling, which has been modelled by using various ad hoc probabilistic models, so far not deduced from the hydrodynamical equations. Recently, ...

This is a follow up of the conference organized last year around similar theme. As in the previous conference, we are interested in the $p$-adic properties of modular forms.The general framework for the study of congruences between modular forms is provided by the theory of $p$-adic modular forms developed in fundamental papers of Serre, Katz, Hida, Ribet, Mazur and Coleman (1970's-1990's).Given a modular form, we associate a Galois representation to that by a classical theorem due to Deligne. We can restrict this Galois representation to different decomposition groups. There is a recent interest to understand the representation for the case $l=p$. Starting with the work of Breuil to formulate mod $p$ and $p$ adic Langlands programme similar to the usual Langlands programme. This representations appear in the cohomology groups of modular curves. Recent development on the subject will be studied for different groups.In the other direction, we will be interested in understanding the Eise...

The Winter School on Quantitative System Biology has been held every year since 2012 at ICTP in Trieste, Italy and ICTS in Bangalore, India in alternating years.The topic of the 2020 School is Ecosystems Ecology, with a special focus on quantitative methods and modelling techniques.Ecology views biological systems as composed of many interdependent parts, whose interactions between themselves and the environment span a wide range of spatial and temporal scales (from cells to the biosphere). This incredible complexity of interactions parallels often with the simplicity of emergent statistical patterns of abundance and biodiversity, as well as nutrient cycling. Describing quantitatively the dynamics of populations, communities and ecosystems requires therefore a broad range of mathematical and modelling techniques. Thanks to new experimental and sequencing techniques, community and ecosystem ecology are experiencing a revolution, as they are transitioning from a traditionally data-poor d...