RESEARCHED WITH AUTUMN
TCTerence Chi-Shen Tao
Fields Medalist; Professor of Mathematics at UCLA
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) · 
Los Angeles, California, United States · academic
Los Angeles, California, United States · academicLinkedIn followers13.8K
Details
Harmonic analysisPartial differential equationsAdditive number theoryCombinatoricsErgodic theoryRandom matrix theoryCompressed sensingAnalytic number theoryArtificial intelligence and mathematicsGifted educationOpen-access mathematics publishing
Notes
- Represented Australia at the IMO three times: bronze (1986, aged 10), silver (1987) and gold (1988, rank 13, 34/42 points) - among the youngest medalists in IMO history.
- Awarded the Fields Medal in 2006 for contributions to partial differential equations, combinatorics, harmonic analysis and additive number theory.
- Selected as an inaugural Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics laureate in 2014, a $3 million award.
- Through 2026 he is a leading voice on the impact of AI on mathematics, arguing it must spark a rapid revolution in how math is done.
- Became the first UCLA mathematics professor to win the Fields Medal ('Mozart of Math').
- Runs a widely-read mathematics blog, 'What's new', with research updates, expository papers and open-problem discussion.
- Publicly active on Mathstodon (Mastodon) as @tao@mathstodon.xyz.
Experience
Professor at UCLA
Research & Teaching at the Department of Mathematics
Honourary Professor at Australian National University
Visiting Professor at University of New South Wales
Education
Princeton University
Jan 1996
PhD, Mathematics
Flinders University
Jan 1992
BSc, Mathematics
AchievementsRepresented Australia at the International Mathematical Olympiad in 1986 (bronze, aged 10), 1987 (silver) and 1988 (gold) · One of the youngest-ever IMO medalists, winning bronze at age 10 · Earned a PhD in mathematics from Princeton at age 21 (1996) · Became a full professor at UCLA at age 24 · Solved (with Allen Knutson) Horn's conjecture on Hermitian matrices
AwardsFields Medal (2006) · MacArthur Fellowship (2006) · Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics (2014) · Royal Medal (2014) · Crafoord Prize in Mathematics (2012) · Bôcher Memorial Prize (2002) · Clay Research Award (2003) · Salem Prize (2000) · Australian Mathematical Society Medal (2005) · János Bolyai International Mathematics Award (2020) · Global Australian of the Year (2022) · Princeton University Madison Medal (2026)
Profiles
Competition record
Australia · IMO