Richard Taylor (mathematician) facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Richard Taylor
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Taylor in 1999
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Richard Lawrence Taylor
19 May 1962 Cambridge, England
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| Nationality | British, American |
| Alma mater | Clare College, Cambridge (BA) Princeton University (PhD) |
| Awards | Whitehead Prize (1990) Fermat Prize (2001) Ostrowski Prize (2001) Cole Prize (2002) Shaw Prize (2007) Clay Research Award (2007) Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics (2015) |
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| Fields | Mathematics |
| Institutions | University of Oxford Harvard University Institute for Advanced Study Stanford University |
| Thesis | On congruences between modular forms (1988) |
| Doctoral advisor | Andrew Wiles |
| Doctoral students |
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Richard Lawrence Taylor, born on May 19, 1962, is a famous British mathematician. He studies something called number theory, which is a branch of mathematics that looks at the properties and relationships of numbers.
Today, he is a special professor at Stanford University in the United States. He has won many important awards for his work, including the Cole Prize, the Shaw Prize, and the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics.
Contents
Richard Taylor's Journey in Math
Richard Taylor started his university studies at Clare College, which is part of the University of Cambridge in England. He earned his first degree there. While at Cambridge, he was even the president of a student math group called The Archimedeans for a couple of years.
After Cambridge, he went to Princeton University in the United States. There, he earned his PhD in mathematics in 1988. His main teacher and guide for his PhD was another famous mathematician, Andrew Wiles. Richard's PhD project was about "congruences between modular forms," which are special kinds of mathematical functions.
Teaching and Research Roles
After finishing his PhD, Richard Taylor returned to the University of Cambridge. He worked there as a lecturer and reader from 1988 to 1995.
Then, he moved to Oxford University for a year, where he held a very important position called the Savilian Chair of Geometry. From 1996 to 2012, he was a professor of mathematics at Harvard University in the United States.
Later, he joined the Institute for Advanced Study, a famous place where scientists and mathematicians do research. Since 2018, he has been a professor at Stanford University.
Important Discoveries in Mathematics
Richard Taylor is known for his amazing work in number theory. He has helped solve some very difficult math problems.
Fermat's Last Theorem
One of his most famous achievements was helping to prove Fermat's Last Theorem. This was a math problem that had puzzled mathematicians for over 350 years! Richard Taylor worked with his former teacher, Andrew Wiles, on this proof. Their work was a huge breakthrough in mathematics.
Other Key Research Areas
Taylor also worked with another mathematician, Michael Harris, to prove something called the "local Langlands conjectures" for a type of mathematical group called GL(n). This is a very advanced area of number theory.
He also helped complete the proof of the Taniyama–Shimura conjecture. This conjecture is very important because it connects two different areas of mathematics: elliptic curves and modular forms. This connection was key to proving Fermat's Last Theorem.
In 2008, Richard Taylor also announced a proof for part of the Sato–Tate conjecture. This conjecture is about how often certain patterns appear in elliptic curves.
Awards and Special Recognitions
Richard Taylor has received many prestigious awards for his contributions to mathematics:
- He won the Whitehead Prize in 1990.
- He received the Fermat Prize and the Ostrowski Prize in 2001.
- The Cole Prize from the American Mathematical Society was awarded to him in 2002.
- He shared the Shaw Prize for Mathematics in 2007.
- In 2015, he received the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics. This award recognized his many important results in the theory of "automorphic forms," including his work on the Taniyama–Weil conjecture, the local Langlands conjecture, and the Sato–Tate conjecture.
He has also been elected as a member of several important academic groups, including the Fellow of the Royal Society in 1995 and the National Academy of Sciences in 2015.
About His Family
Richard Taylor's father is also a well-known British physicist named John Clayton Taylor. Richard is married and has two children.
