LA Probability Forum

UCLA, talks in Math Sciences Room 6627

A dimer tiling of Z^d is a collection of edges such that every vertex is covered exactly once. In 2000, Cohn, Kenyon, and Propp showed that 2D dimer tilings satisfy a large deviations principle. In joint work with Nishant Chandgotia and Scott Sheffield, we prove an analogous large deviations principle for dimers in 3D. A lot of the results for dimers in two dimensions use tools and exact formulas (e.g. the height function representation of a tiling or the Kasteleyn determinant formula) that are specific to dimension 2. In this talk, I will explain how to formulate the large deviations principle in 3D, show simulations, and explain some of the ways that we use a smaller set of tools (e.g. Hall's matching theorem or a double dimer swapping operation) in our arguments. Time permitting, I will also describe results and problems that illustrate some of the ways that three dimensions is qualitatively different from two.