KVIG Informative

The most prestigious prize in mathematics went to three researchers at American universities this summer, and to only the third woman in the medal’s history.

The International Mathematical Union announced the 2026 Fields Medals on July 23 at the opening ceremony of the International Congress of Mathematicians in Philadelphia. The congress ran through July 30 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center. The medal goes to between two and four mathematicians under 40 every four years, recognizing both finished work and the promise of future achievement, according to the union.

The four medalists are Yu Deng, 37, of the University of Chicago; John Pardon, 37, of Stony Brook University on Long Island; Jacob Tsimerman, 38, of the University of Toronto; and Hong Wang, 35, of New York University and the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques in France. Three of the four work at U.S. institutions.

Wang is the third woman to receive a Fields Medal, after Maryam Mirzakhani in 2014 and Maryna Viazovska in 2022, according to the European Mathematical Society.

The union cited Deng for his work on partial differential equations, including a rigorous derivation of the Boltzmann equation for rarefied gases from hard-sphere dynamics. The citation also covers his derivation of wave kinetic equations from nonlinear systems and his probabilistic approaches to nonlinear Schrödinger dynamics.

A report from the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences said Tsimerman was honored for greatly extending the reach of o-minimal techniques in arithmetic and complex algebraic geometry, including his proof of Griffiths’ conjecture on the algebraicity of images of period maps. The union also gave its Abacus Medal, for the theory and analysis of algorithms, to Shayan Oveis Gharan.

Math is also being measured closer to home. American fourth and eighth graders took the 2026 National Assessment of Educational Progress in math and reading, the first administered on newly rewritten frameworks, according to the Education Department’s Institute of Education Sciences. Results are scheduled for early 2027.

The Fields Medal rewards promise as much as results, by the union’s own standard. American students will find out in early 2027 how they measured up on a rewritten math test.