illustrare – promovere – inspirare
We are pleased to announce that the Poljak lecture 2026 will take place on 19 May 2026. The speaker is Béla Bollobás from the University of Cambridge and the University of Memphis.
(Audimax HS 9, Innstraße 31)
15:30 The life and work of Svatopluk Poljak
Several of Svat'a’s former colleagues and friends share their personal memories of him while paying tribute to his contributions to science.
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17:00 Poljak lecture by Béla Bollobás
Title: Covering systems
Abstract: Covering systems were introduced by Paul Erdős in 1934, and provided his favourite problems for the rest of his life. In the lecture, first I shall present some of the early results, and then I shall describe a major result or two obtained in the last decade. The talk will end with several unsolved problems.
Joint work with Paul Balister (Oxford), Rob Morris (IMPA), Julian Sahasrabudhe (Cambridge) and Marius Tiba (Lausanne).
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Attendance is free, but we kindly ask that you register by 12 May so we can plan the catering accordingly.
The inaugural Poljak lecture took place on 13 May 2025 and was delivered by Jaroslav Nešetřil from Charles University Prague.
(Audimax HS 9, Innstraße 31)
16:00 The life and work of Svatopluk Poljak
official greetings by vice-president Jan Schumann and vice-dean Fabian Wirth
presentations by Jana Poljaková, Daniel Turzík, Franz Rendl and Franz Brandenburg
video messages by Michel Goemans, Monique Laurent and Ryan O'Donnell
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17:00 Inaugural Poljak lecture by Jaroslav Nešetřil
“Subgraphs, orderings and homomorphisms”
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20:00 Dinner at "Das Oberhaus"
The Poljak lecture is a newly established lecture series taking place once a year. It is named in honour of Svatopluk Poljak, who was professor of mathematics at the University of Passau in the 1990s and made important contributions to diverse areas such as Combinatorics, Operations Research, Mathematical Programming, Theoretical Computer Science and Systems Theory. Each lecture is delivered by a highly distinguished mathematician or computer scientist whose work has influenced various fields. The envisioned purpose of the lectures is to illustrate the beauty of mathematical research and its significance to our society, to promote interdisciplinary collaboration and to inspire the next generation of researchers.
Svatopluk Poljak was born in Prague on October 9, 1951. He studied mathematics at Charles University in Prague and eventually completed his PhD in 1980 under the supervision of Jaroslav Nešetřil and Zdeněk Hedrlín. Afterwards, Poljak took a position at the Czech Technical University. In 1986, he moved back to Charles University for a senior research position. During this time, he was invited for extended academic visits to Kyoto, New Brunswick, Paris, Bonn and Taipei. Notably, he was awarded a Humboldt Fellowship for his 18-month stay at the University of Bonn. In 1994, Poljak was appointed as professor of mathematics at the University of Passau. He died on April 2, 1995 in a car accident.
