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   The Shapiro Conjecture Frank Sottile Texas A&M University 18 November 2005 Séminaire Géométrie, Université de Savoie  | 
  
    
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   About 10 years ago, Boris Shapiro and Michael Shapiro
   made a remarkable conjecture about real solutions to 
   geometric problems coming from the classical Schubert calculus.
   While the conjecture remains open, there is truly overwhelming
   computational evidence supporting it, and Eremenko and Gabrielov
   proved it for Grassmannians of 2-planes, where the conjecture is 
   the appealing statement that a rational function with only real 
   critical points must be real.
   In my talk, I will introduce the Shapiro conjecture and discuss what we know about it. This includes a simple counterexample and a refinement which is supported by massive experimental evidence.  | 
  
     
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