Indian-Australian researcher Akshay Venkatesh has won the Fields Medal, also described the Nobel prize of mathematics, becoming the second Australian to bag the world's most prestigious maths award.
The Medal is awarded by the International Mathematical Union once every four years- recognising outstanding mathematical achievements of scholars under the age of 40.
Currently working at the Stanford University, 36-year old Professor Venkatesh has been recognised for broad range of subjects in mathematics, including number theory, homogeneous dynamics, representation theory and arithmetic geometry.
Prof. Akshay Venkatesh Source: superscholar.org
“He solved many longstanding problems by combining methods from seemingly unrelated areas, presented novel viewpoints on classical problems, and produced strikingly far-reaching conjectures,” the award citation reads.
His work encompasses number theory, automorphic forms, representation theory and ergodic theory.
He was born in Delhi (India) in 1981 and later moved to Perth in Australia. He was a child prodigy, becoming the only Australian to win medals at both the International Physics Olympiad and International Mathematics Olympiad when he was just 12.
He entered the University of Western Australia as the youngest ever student at the age of 13 and graduated with honours at 16, earning a BSc in Maths and Physics.
Australian professor Akshay Venkatesh has received the world's most important prize in mathematics. (AAP) Source: AAP
"At our first meeting I was speaking with Akshay’s mother Svetha, while Akshay was sitting at a table in my office reading my blackboard which contained fragments from a supervision of one of my PhD students, just completed,” Prof Cheryl Praeger a mentor at the University of Western Australia, said.
“At Akshay’s request, I explained what the problem was. He coped with quite a lot of detail and I found that he could easily grasp the essence of the research,” Professor Praeger recall.
He started his doctoral research at the age of 17 and received his PhD from at Princeton University when he was 21.
Prof Venkatesh’s mother- herself a professor of Computer Science at Deakin University said he was a normal child.
"He was a normal, happy child growing up in a normal family," the ABC quoted her as saying.
"I am very proud that he got this award and I'm very proud of the person he is," she said.
Three other winners of the Fields Medal 2018 are Caucher Birkar, Alessio Figalli and Peter Scholze.
An undated handout photo made available by the Institute for Advanced Study Princeton of Australian mathematician Akshay Venkatesh. Source: AAP
In 2016, he was awarded the Infosys Prize in Mathematical Sciences. He is also a recipient the Ostrowski Prize (2017), the Salem Prize (2007), Packard Fellowship (2007) and the SASTRA Ramanujan Prize (2008).
