Latest news with #KakeyaConjecture
South China Morning Post
6 days ago
- Science
- South China Morning Post
China's cyber nationalists target maths star Hong Wang over lectures in English
It was a golden opportunity for academic exchange when Chinese mathematician Hong Wang , a contender for a top award, gave lectures at universities in Beijing last month, but instead her overseas experience and use of English made her an unexpected victim of rising nationalism in China. The 34-year-old mathematician earned global attention last year when a paper she co-authored solved the three-dimensional Kakeya conjecture – a century-old problem in geometric measure theory. The study, with implications for imaging, data processing, cryptography and wireless communication, makes her a leading contender for the Fields Medal, regarded as the Nobel Prize of mathematics. Winners of the prize, awarded every four years, will be announced next year. Wang was born in the southern city of Guilin. She graduated from Peking University then completed a postgraduate degree in France and a doctorate in the US. She is now an associate professor at the New York University Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. She will join Institut des Hautes Etudes Scientifiques near Paris as a permanent professor of mathematics starting in September, according to an announcement in May. Last month, she gave seminars on her research at Peking University, Beijing International Centre for Mathematical Research, Capital Normal University, Tsinghua University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, with every venue full and bustling with attendees.
South China Morning Post
25-06-2025
- Science
- South China Morning Post
Star mathematician Joshua Zahl leaves Canada for China after solving century-old puzzle
China has secured a major academic coup with the recruitment of mathematics luminary Joshua Zahl, recently celebrated for solving the more than 100-year-old three-dimensional Kakeya conjecture. Zahl is leaving Canada's University of British Columbia (UBC) to take up a full-time position as a chair professor at Nankai University's Chern Institute of Mathematics (CIM), according to the Chinese educational institution's website. Zahl and his collaborator Wang Hong from New York University posted their milestone proof in a 127-page preprint paper on the open-access repository arXiv in February, and the feat was immediately hailed by the prominent UCLA mathematician Terence Tao. Writing on his blog a day after the paper appeared, Tao described the achievement as 'some spectacular progress in geometric measure theory', confirming that Zahl and Wang had resolved 'the three-dimensional case of the infamous Kakeya set conjecture'. Tao, who is also Zahl's doctoral mentor, has long been focused on the Kakeya problem. He published his ideas on the conjecture in 2014 on his blog, providing a foundation for Zahl and Wang's work. 'It's like perfecting a perpetual-motion machine. It's magical; they are getting more out of the output than they put in. Their approach proves the three-dimensional Kakeya conjecture,' Tao wrote.
