The Mathematics of Open Reaction Networks

Next week, Blake Pollard and I will talk about our work on reaction networks. We’ll do this at Dynamics, Thermodynamics and Information Processing in Chemical Networks, a workshop at the University of Luxembourg organized by Massimiliano Esposito and Matteo Polettini. We’ll do it on Tuesday, 13 June 2017, from 11:00 to 13:00, in room BSC 3.03 of the Bâtiment des Sciences. If you’re around, please stop by and say hi!

Here are the slides for my talk:

The mathematics of open reaction networks.

Abstract. To describe systems composed of interacting parts, scientists and engineers draw diagrams of networks: flow charts, electrical circuit diagrams, signal-flow graphs, Feynman diagrams and the like. In principle all these different diagrams fit into a common framework: the mathematics of monoidal categories. This has been known for some time. However, the details are more challenging, and ultimately more rewarding, than this basic insight. Here we explain how various applications of reaction networks and Petri nets fit into this framework.

If you see typos or other problems please let me know now!

I hope to blog a bit about the workshop… it promises to be very interesting.

2 Responses to The Mathematics of Open Reaction Networks

  1. james stasheff says:

    not til slide 14 did I ind out why the word reaction

    • John Baez says:

      Thanks! But since it’s a conference on reaction networks, I don’t think explaining the term “reaction networks” is a high priority!

      On the other hand, I expect that most of the audience won’t know what a monoidal category is.

      (By the way, chemists usually call them “chemical reaction networks”, but since they’re good for other things I call them “reaction networks”. I hope this will help get non-chemists interested. For some reason the organizers of this conference chose, in their title, to call them “chemical networks”.)

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