Phase Transitions in Combinatorial Optimization Problems

Alexander K. Hartmann, Ph.D. (1998) from the University of Heidelberg, Diplom (1993) from the University of Duisburg. Since January 2003, Head of the Junior Research group Complex Ground States of Disordered Systems at the University of Göttingen funded by the Volkswagen Stiftung. 1998-2003, Research Assistant in Prof. Annette Zippelius' group at the University of Göttingen. 2001, Visiting Scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz and the Ecole Normale Superieure. His research interests are the computer simulations of spin glasses, random field systems and diluted antiferromagnets, gas atoms inside polymer systems, combinatorial optimization problems, random surfaces and surface sputtering, and biophysics (RNA secondary structures and sequence alignment). Martin Weigt, born 1970 in Berlin, Germany; Ph.D. (1998) from Otto-von-Guericke University, Magdeburg, Diplom (1993) from Humboldt University Berlin. Since 1999, Research Assistant in Prof. Annette Zippelius' group at the University of Göttingen. In 2000, 2001, and 2002, Visiting Scientist at the International Centre of Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy. His research interests are statistical mechanics of disordered systems and application in random combinatorics and theoretical computer science.