Hubert L. Bray, Professor

Hubert L. Bray

Professor Hubert Bray studies geometric analysis, general relativity, and astrophysics. Video links for many of his talks are listed below under "Selected Invited Lectures." The videos labeled "Broad Audience Talk" are ideal for those with a general knowledge of math and physics. The "Research Talk" lectures are ideal for advanced graduate students and others working in these areas.

Office Location:  189 Physics
Office Phone:  (919) 757-8428
Email Address: send me a message
Web Page:  http://www.math.duke.edu/~bray/main.html

Teaching (Fall 2012):

Office Hours:

Thursdays, 4-6 pm
Education:

PhDStanford University (adviser: Richard Schoen)1997
BSRice University, Math and Physics, summa cum laude1992
Specialties:

Geometry
Analysis
Mathematical Physics
Research Interests: Geometric Analysis, General Relativity, Astrophysics

Current Ph.D. Students  

Postdocs Mentored

Representative Publications

  1. H.L. Bray, On Dark Matter, Spiral Galaxies, and the Axioms of General Relativity (Preprint, 2010) [html]
  2. H.L. Bray and M.A. Khuri, P.D.E.'s Which Imply the Penrose Conjecture, Asian Journal of Mathematics (Accepted, 2011) [arXiv:0905.2622v1]  [author's comments]
  3. H.L. Bray, S. Brendle, M. Eichmair, A. Neves, Area-Minimizing Projective Planes in 3-Manifolds, Communications in Pure and Applied Mathematics (2010) [arXiv:0909.1665v1]
  4. H.L. Bray, S. Brendle, A. Neves, Rigidity of Area-Minimizing Two-Spheres in Three-Manifolds, Communications in Analysis and Geometry (2010) [2814]
  5. H.L. Bray and J.L. Jauregui, A Geometric Theory of Zero Area Singularities in General Relativity (Submitted, 2009) [arXiv:0909.0522v1]
  6. H.L. Bray, D.A. Lee, On the Riemannian Penrose Inequality in Dimension Less Than Eight, Duke Mathematical Journal, vol. 148 no. 1 (2009), pp. 81-106 [arXiv:0705.1128v1]
  7. H.L. Bray, P. Miao, On the Capacity of Surfaces in Manifolds with Nonnegative Scalar Curvature, Inventiones Mathematicae, vol. 172 no. 3 (June, 2008) [arXiv:0707.3337v1]
  8. H.L. Bray, A Family of Quasi-local Mass Functionals with Monotone Flows, in Proceedings of the 14th International Congress on Mathematical Physics, Lisbon, Portugal, 2003, edited by Jean-Claude Zambrini (2003) [books]
  9. H.L. Bray and A. Neves, Classification of Prime 3-Manifolds with Yamabe Invariant Greater than RP^3, Annals of Mathematics, vol. 159 no. 1 (2004), pp. 407--424 [p09]
  10. H. L. Bray and F. Finster, Curvature Estimates and the Positive Mass Theorem, Communications in Analysis and Geometry, vol. 10 no. 2 (2002), pp. 291--306 [arXiv:math/9906047v3]
  11. H. L. Bray, Proof of the Riemannian Penrose Inequality Using the Positive Mass Theorem, Journal of Differential Geometry, vol. 59 no. 2 (2001), pp. 177--267 [arXiv:math/9911173v1]
  12. H.L. Bray, The Penrose Inequality in General Relativity and Volume Comparison Theorems Involving Scalar Curvature (1997) (thesis, Stanford University.) [arXiv:0902.3241v1]
Selected Invited Lectures

  1. On Dark Matter, Spiral Galaxies, and the Axioms of General Relativity, May 12, 2011, 41st Barrett Memorial Lectures in Mathematical Relativity, University of Tennessee, Knoxville (Research Talk, with video) [available here]    
  2. On Dark Matter, Spiral Galaxies, and the Axioms of General Relativity, April 15, 2011, The 26th Annual Geometry Festival at the University of Pennsylvania (Research Talk - slides only - 100MB; the talk above was very similar and has video) [pdf]    
  3. Dark Matter in Galaxies (Dark Matter Awareness Week talk) by Hubert Bray and Andriy Badin, December 6, 2010, Duke University (Survey Talk) 112 minutes total - Part I (66 minutes): Bray describes the astronomical evidence for dark matter in galaxies. Part II (21 minutes, 66 minutes in): Badin describes searches for dark matter particles. Part III (25 minutes, 87 minutes in): Bray describes his work on a general relativity approach to dark matter described by a scalar field satisfying the Klein-Gordon equation as a possible explanation for spiral patterns in galaxies [video.html]    
  4. From Black Holes and the Big Bang to Dark Energy and (maybe even) Dark Matter: Successes of Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, December 13, 2010, University of Tennessee (Broad Audience Talk) 45 minutes [video.html]    
  5. From Pythagoras to Einstein: How Geometry Describes the Large-Scale Structure of the Universe (Part 1), March 26, 2011, Duke University Graduate Student Recruiting Weekend (Broad Audience Talk) [video.html]    
  6. From Pythagoras to Einstein: How Geometry Describes the Large-Scale Structure of the Universe (Part 2), March 26, 2011, Duke University Graduate Student Recruiting Weekend (Broad Audience Talk) [video.html]    
  7. An Overview of General Relativity, October 3, 2008, Duke University Graduate/Faculty Seminar (Broad Audience Talk) [video.html]    
  8. What Do Black Holes and Soap Bubbles Have in Common?, September 21, 2007, Duke University Graduate/Faculty Seminar (Broad Audience Talk) [video.html]    
  9. Black Holes and the Curvature of Spacetime, November 7, 2005, Michigan State University (Broad Audience Talk) [html]    
  10. Negative Point Mass Singularities in General Relativity, August, 2005, Sir Isaac Newton Institute, Cambridge, England (Research Talk) [available here]    
  11. Generalization of the Hawking Mass, August, 2002, 50 Years of the Cauchy Problem in General Relativity, Cargese, Corsica (Research Talk) [available here]    
  12. Proof of the Poincare Conjecture for 3-Manifolds with Yamabe Invariant Greater than RP^3, August, 2002, 50 Years of the Cauchy Problem in General Relativity, Cargese, Corsica (Research Talk) [available here]    
  13. Black Holes, the Penrose Conjecture, and Quasi-local Mass, August, 2002, 50 Years of the Cauchy Problem in General Relativity, Cargese, Corsica (Research Talk) [available here]    
  14. Black Holes, Minimal Surfaces, and Geometric Flows, April 28, 2001, Duke Math Journal Conference, Duke University (Research Talk) [video.html]    
  15. Quasi-local Mass and Black Holes in General Relativity, April 28, 2001, Geometry Seminar, Duke University (Research Talk) [video.html]    
  16. Proof of the Riemannian Penrose Conjecture, June 25, 1999, Institute for Theoretical Physics, UC Santa Barbara (Research Talk) [available here]    
Selected Grant Support

Conferences Organized