Robust mechanisms for chaos, II: Stable ergodicity and partial hyperbolicity

Kolmogorov introduced in the 1950's a robust mechanism for non-ergodicity, which is now known as the KAM phenomenon (named for Kologorov, Arnol'd and Moser). A current, pressing problem in smooth dynamics is to understand the interplay between KAM and Hopf phenomena in specific classes of dynamical systems. I will describe a class of dynamical systems, called the partially hyperbolic systems, in which the two phenomena can in some sense be combined. I'll also explain recent results that give strong evidence for the truth of a modified ergodic hypothesis in this setting, known as the Pugh-Shub stable ergodicity conjecture.