2021 Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics for Martin Hairer#

It is our great pleasure to inform you that our colleague Martin Hairer (FRS KBE), professor at Imperial College London, and a member of the Mathematics section of Academia Europaea, was awarded the 2021 Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics "for transformative contributions to the theory of stochastic analysis, particularly the theory of regularity structures in stochastic partial differential equations."

In particular his work solved the so-called "Kardar-Parisi-Zhang equation", which is the default model for many physical phenomena including interface growth processes, interacting particle systems and polymers in random environments.

See https://breakthroughprize.org/News/60 for the official announcement and a description of the prize.

Philippe Michel, Chair of the Mathematics section
Endre Süli, member of the Mathematics section

About the Breakthrough Prize#

The Breakthrough Prizes were founded by Sergey Brin, Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg, Yuri and Julia Milner, and Anne Wojcicki. The Prizes have been sponsored by the personal foundations established by Sergey Brin, Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg, Ma Huateng, Jack Ma, Yuri and Julia Milner and Anne Wojcicki.

The Breakthrough Prizes are the largest prizes in science, and aim to “help scientific leaders gain freedom from financial constraints to focus fully on the world of ideas; to raise the profile and prestige of basic science and mathematics, fomenting a culture in which intellectual pursuits are validated; and to inspire the next generation of researchers to follow the lead of these extraordinary scientific role models.”