We study spectral and scattering properties of the Laplacian$H$^{(σ)}=-Δ in $L_2(\mathbf{R}^{d+1}_+)$ corresponding to the boundary condition $\frac{\partial u}{\partial\nu} + \sigma u = 0$ with a periodic function σ. For non-negative σ we prove that$H$^{(σ)}is unitarily equivalent to the Neumann Laplacian$H$^{(0)}. In general, there appear additional channels of scattering due to surface states. We prove absolute continuity of the spectrum of$H$^{(σ)}under mild assumptions on σ.

The prolongation g^{(k)} of a linear Lie algebra g \subset gl(V) plays an important role in the study of symmetries of G-structures. Cartan and Kobayashi-Nagano have given a complete classification of irreducible linear Lie algebras g \subset gl(V) with non-zero prolongations. If g is the Lie algebra aut(\hat{S}) of infinitesimal linear automorphisms of a projective variety S \subset \BP V, its prolongation g^{(k)} is related to the symmetries of cone structures, an important example of which is the variety of minimal rational tangents in the study of uniruled projective manifolds. From this perspective, understanding the prolongation aut(\hat{S})^{(k)} is useful in questions related to the automorphism groups of uniruled projective manifolds. Our main result is a complete classification of irreducible non-degenerate nonsingular variety with non zero prolongations, which can be viewed as a generalization of the result of Cartan and Kobayashi-Nagano. As an application, we show that when S is linearly normal and Sec(S) \neq P(V), the blow-up of P(V) along S has the target rigidity property, i.e., any deformation of a surjective morphism Y \to Bl_S(PV) comes from the automorphisms of Bl_S(PV).

A birational transformation f: P^n --> Z, where Z is a nonsingular variety of Picard number 1, is called a special birational transformation of type (a, b) if f is given by a linear system of degree a, its inverse is given by a linear system of degree b and the base locus S \subset P^n of f is irreducible and nonsingular. In this paper, we classify special birational transformations of type (2,1). In addition to previous works Alzati-Sierra and Russo on this topic, our proof employs natural C^*-actions on Z in a crucial way. These C^*-actions also relate our result to the problem studied in our previous work on smooth projective varieties with nonzero prolongations.

For $1 \leq p < \infty$, Ludwig, Haberl and Parapatits classified $L_p$ Minkowski valuations intertwining the special linear group with additional conditions such as homogeneity and continuity. In this paper,a complete classification of $L_p$ Minkowski valuations intertwining the special linear group on polytopes without any additional conditions is established for $p \geq 1$ including $p = \infty$. For $n=3$ and $p=1$, there exist valuations not mentioned before.

We define a notion of formal quantum field theory and associate a formal quantum field theory to K-theoretical intersection theories on Hilbert schemes of points on algebraic surfaces. This enables us to find an effective way to compute K-theoretical intersection theories on Hilbert schemes via a connection to Macdonald polynomials and vertex operators.