David Ben-Zvi

Jul 19, 2024 | zephyrnet.com | David Ben-Zvi

In 1940, the French mathematician and artillery officer Jean Leray was taken prisoner by the Germans. He told his captors that he was a topologist, fearful that if they discovered his true area of expertise, hydrodynamics, they would force him to aid the German war effort. For the nearly five years of his imprisonment, Leray kept up this subterfuge by carrying out research in topology, a branch of mathematics that studies deformable shapes.

Jul 19, 2024 | quantamagazine.org | Erica Klarreich |David Ben-Zvi

IntroductionA group of nine mathematicians has proved the geometric Langlands conjecture, a key component of one of the most sweeping paradigms in modern mathematics. The proof represents the culmination of three decades of effort, said Peter Scholze, a prominent mathematician at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics who was not involved in the proof.

Jul 19, 2024 | quantamagazine.org | David Ben-Zvi

IntroductionIn 1940, the French mathematician and artillery officer Jean Leray was taken prisoner by the Germans. He told his captors that he was a topologist, fearful that if they discovered his true area of expertise, hydrodynamics, they would force him to aid the German war effort. For the nearly five years of his imprisonment, Leray kept up this subterfuge by carrying out research in topology, a branch of mathematics that studies deformable shapes.

Oct 12, 2023 | quantamagazine.org | Kevin Hartnett |David Ben-Zvi

IntroductionIn 2018, as he prepared to be awarded the Fields Medal, math’s highest honor, Akshay Venkatesh carried a piece of paper in his pocket. On it, he had written a table of mathematical expressions that for centuries have played a key role in number theory. Though the expressions had featured prominently in Venkatesh’s own research over the last decade, he carried them around not as a memento of what he’d accomplished, but as a reminder of something he still didn’t understand.