Daniel Freedman Wins Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics

Professor emeritus Daniel Z. Freedman has been awarded the Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics. He shares the $3 million prize with two colleagues, Sergio Ferrara of CERN and Peter van Nieuwenhuizen of Stony Brook University, with whom he developed the theory of supergravity.

“Dan’s work on supergravity has changed how scientists think about physics beyond the standard model, combining principles of supersymmetry and Einstein’s theory of general relativity,” says Michael Sipser, dean of the MIT School of Science and the Donner Professor of Mathematics. “His exemplary research is central to mathematical physics and has given us new pathways to explore in quantum field theory and superstring theory.”

Congratulations Dan!

Read more about Dan’s achievement in the MIT News.

Bonnie Berger Receives ISCB Senior Scientist Award

Bonnie Berger was honored by the International Society for Computational Biology for the Senior Scientist Accomplishment Award at the ISMB/ECCB Conference, July 21-25, 2019 in Basel, Switzerland. At the conference, Bonnie presented the keynote address, "Biomedical Data Sharing and Analysis at Scale."

The ISCB Senior Scientist Accomplishment Award recognizes leaders in the fields of computational biology and bioinformatics for their significant research, education, and service contribution.

Congratulations Bonnie!

Zhiwei Yun Awarded ICCM Gold Medal

Zhiwei (second from left) receives the ICCM Gold Medal of Mathematics by faculty members of Tsinghua University including Shing-Tung Yau (far right), chairman and co-founder of ICCM. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Zhiwei Yun received the Gold Medal of Mathematics at June’s 8th International Congress of Chinese Mathematicians (ICCM) in Beijing.

At the last Congress, which was in 2016, Zhiwei had received a Silver medal, and Wei Zhang received a Gold medal.

Formerly known as the Morningside Medal of Mathematics, this recognition is given to exceptional mathematicians of Chinese descent under the age of 45 for their achievements in pure and applied mathematics.

Congratulations Zhiwei!

Elchanan Mossel Named 2019 Simons Investigator

Elchanan Mossel has been named a 2019 Simons Investigator in Mathematics.

This award is given to outstanding theoretical scientists to support long-term investigations of fundamental questions.

Congratulations Elchanan!