Fields Medal

Fields Medal, officially known as International Medal for Outstanding Discoveries in Mathematics, award granted to between two and four mathematicians for outstanding or seminal research. The Fields Medal is often referred to as the mathematical equivalent of the Nobel Prize, but it is granted only every four years and is given, by tradition, to mathematicians under the age of 40, rather than to more senior scholars.

The Fields Medal originated from surplus funds raised by John Charles Fields (1863–1932), a professor of mathematics at the University of Toronto, as organizer and president of the 1924 International Congress of Mathematicians in Toronto. The Committee of the International Congress had $2,700 left after printing the conference proceedings and voted to set aside $2,500 for the establishment of two medals to be awarded at later congresses. Following an endowment from Fields’s estate, the proposed awards—contrary to his explicit request—became known as the Fields Medals. The first two Fields Medals were awarded in 1936. An anonymous donation allowed the number of prize medals to increase starting in 1966. Medalists also receive a small (currently $1,500) cash award. A related award, the Rolf Nevanlinna Prize, has also been presented at each International Congress of Mathematicians since 1982. It is awarded to one young mathematician for work dealing with the mathematical aspects of information science.

The International Mathematical Union’s executive committee appoints Fields Medal and Nevanlinna Prize committees, to which national committees may suggest candidates in writing to the secretary of the International Mathematical Union. The medals have been presented at each International Congress of Mathematicians since 1936. (See table.)

The Fields Medal is a good indicator of current fertile areas of mathematical research, as the winners have generally made contributions that opened up whole fields or integrated technical ideas and tools from a wide variety of disciplines. A preponderance of winners worked in highly abstract and integrative fields such as algebraic geometry and algebraic topology. This is to some extent a reflection of the influence and power of the French consortium of mathematicians, writing since 1939 under the name of Nicolas Bourbaki, which in its multivolume Éléments de mathématiques has sought a modern, rigorous, and comprehensive treatment of all of mathematics and mathematical foundations. However, medals have also been awarded for work in more classical fields of mathematics and for mathematical physics, including a number for solutions to problems that David Hilbert enunciated at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris in 1900.

A marked clustering of Fields Medalists may be observed within a few research institutions. In particular, almost half of the medalists have held appointments at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, N.J., U.S.