IHES Annual Report 2020 | 17

Vasily PESTUN Theoretical physics, permanent professor since 2014.

In 2020, VASILY PESTUN continued his work on integrable system and supersymmetric quantum field theories. In particular, he worked on the representation theory of anti-dominantly shifted Yangians in relation to the quantization of moduli space of G-multiplicative Higgs fields on rational curve with framed singularity at infinity, the moduli space of periodic G-monopoles and Coulomb branches on N=2 supersymmetric field theories. Together with Rouven Frassek and Alexander Tsymbaliuk he constructed the explicit isomorphism between Drinfeld and RTT realization of anti-dominantly shifted Yangian and explicit Lax

matrices that realize this isomorphism. In another line of work, Vasily Pestun started to investigate the potential formalization of mathematical and physical theories using approaches of statistical inference and machine learning.

SCIENTIFIC ACTIVITY

DISTINCTIONS

Gold Medal, 28th International Physics Olympiads (1997) Centennial Fellowship, Princeton University (2003-2008) Porter Ogden Jacobus Fellowship, Princeton University (2007-2008) Junior Fellow, Harvard Society of Fellows (2008-2011) ERC Starting Grant Quantum Algebraic Structures in Field Theories (QUASIFT) (2015) Hermann Weyl Prize (2016)

Editor of: Letters in Mathematical Physics Communications in Mathematical Physics

PUBLICATIONS

With R. Frassek and A. Tsymbaliuk Lax Matrices from Antidominantly Shifted Yangians and Quantum Affine Algebras Prepublication arXiv: 2001.04929.

With N. Fulton, A. Shinnar, B. Targer and K. Vajjha Formalizing Convergence Proofs for Value and Policy Iteration in Coq Prepublication arXiv: 2009.11403.

Focus on... IHES and IBM, a longstanding partnership

The relationship between IHES and IBM is nothing new: IBM was one of the first founding members of the Institute in the 1960s. In the 1980s and 90s, several researchers from IBM Watson also came to Bures-sur-Yvette as visitors. Recently, a deeper relationship was established again between the Institute and IBM.

In 2018, Vasily Pestun attended a conference on artificial intelligence applied to mathematics and vice versa, during which he met several researchers specializing in these topics, including researchers from IBM, with whom he continued to interact with afterwards. In 2019, he made his first visit to Yorktown where

he was hosted for several months in the IBM Watson research teams. Starting in 2020, Vasily Pestun became a principal research staff member of IBM Watson, splitting his time between IHES and Yorktown.

This scientific collaboration has already benefited both parties involved. It has also facilitated closer ties between Institute and IBM France, which has resulted in several exchanges, as well as a first donation made by IBM as part of the ongoing fundraising campaign.