October 8, 2009:  Weian Zheng (University of California, Irvine)
Title: Monge-Kantorovich Problem

Abstract:  We use a simple probability method to transform the celebrated Monge-Kantorovich problem in a bounded region of Euclidean plane into a Dirichlet boundary problem associated to a quasi-linear elliptic equation with 0-order term missing in its diffusion coefficients. Thus, we are also able to give a probability approach to the famous Monge-Ampere equation, which is known to be associated to the above problem.