Chaos and Fractals
Past and Future
Michael F. Shlesinger
Office of Naval Research
About the Lecture
The early ideas on chaos and fractals appeared as strange and isolated, almost paradoxical, concepts. Today they represent rapidly evolving fields of science exploding with activity. In addition, the concept of universal classes of nonlinear behavior has uncovered astonishing connections between seemingly disparate phenomena. This ability to cut across disciplines has helped reverse the trend of specialization into which most of science appeared to be heading. The latest ideas on chaos and fractals hold the promise for a revolution in applications in areas including lasers, electronics, control Systems, image processing, signal detection, and health diagnosis.
About the Speaker
Michael Shlesinger is the Director of the Physics Division at the Office of Naval Research and Program Manager for the fields of Nonlinear Dynamics and Fractals. He received a B.S. degree in Mathematics and Physics from SUNY Stony Brook, and a Ph.D in Physics from the University of Rochester. His own research has focused on fractal stochastic processes related to areas such as disordered materials and turbulence.