MSI Weekly Bulletin - Week starting Monday 5 June, 2006

Homological algebra is a curious branch of mathematics; it is a powerful tool which has been used in many diverse places, without any clear understanding why it should be so useful. We will give a list of applications, proceeding chronologically: first to topology, then to complex analysis, then to algebraic geometry, then to commutative algebra and finally (if we have time) to non-commutative algebra. At the end of the talk I hope to be able to say something about the part of homological algebra on which I have worked, and its applications. That part is derived categories.