Context:
The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announced the Abel Prize 2024 to Michel Talagrand.
More on the news
- Prize has been awarded to French mathematician Michel Talagrand for his advances in describing and predicting the universe’s randomness.
- Talagrand’s work focuses on stochastic systems, which model random variables within a given time and space.
• The Abel committee also commended another element of Talagrand’s work, which shows that even random systems have an element of predictability.
- For example, flipping a coin 1,000 times will predictably yield close to 500 heads and 500 tails.
About Abel Prize
- This Prize is awarded annually to outstanding international mathematicians.
• The prize was established by the Norwegian Government in 2002 and is managed by The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters on behalf of the Norwegian government.
- The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, founded in 1857, is a non-governmental, nationwide body which embraces all fields of science to support the advancement of science and scholarship in Norway.
- The Abel Prize is named after the Norwegian mathematician Niels Henrik Abel, to commemorate his 200th birth anniversary.
- The first Abel Prize, awarded in 2003, went to French mathematician Jean-Pierre Serre.
- The only person of Indian origin to have won this prize is Srinivasa S.R. Varadhan. He taught at the Courant Institute, New York University, and won this prestigious award in 2007.
Niels Henrik Abel (1802 -1829)
- He was a Norwegian mathematician.
- He was the first person to formulate and solve an integral equation.
- He gave proof of the impossibility of solving algebraically the general equation of the fifth degree.
- He gave the theory of elliptic functions.
- To date, the award has only been given to one female mathematician—Karen Keskulla Umlenbeck of the University of Texas in Austin, Texas.
• In 2019 the prize money was increased to 7.5 million Norwegian Kroner (NOK).
- The prize money is granted by the Norwegian Parliament (Stortinget) through the annual national budget.
Nominations for the Prize
- Anyone may nominate candidates for the Abel Prize. However, one may not nominate himself. Such nominations will not be assessed. Both individuals and institutions may put forward nominations.
- Nominations of deceased persons are not accepted.
- The Prize may be awarded to one or several people, but not to institutions or groups, and not more than three individuals.
• The board of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters formally decides who will be the next Abel Prize laureate. They do so on the recommendation of the Abel Committee.
- The Committee comprises a group of internationally outstanding mathematicians.