2024 Retrospective: 10 Years of Artur Avila's Fields Medal

It was on August 12, 2014, that Artur Avila added his name to the select list of researchers awarded the Fields Medal. The prize, known as the Nobel Prize of Mathematics, is awarded by the International Mathematical Union (IMU) every four years to mathematicians under 40 years of age who have made extraordinary contributions to the field. To this day, Avila is the only researcher trained in the Southern Hemisphere to be recognized with the prize. The 10th anniversary of the achievement was celebrated in the press. In October, the researcher from IMPA and the University of Zurich, Switzerland, participated in the program "Conversa com Bial," alongside the director-general of IMPA, Marcelo Viana. To journalist Pedro Bial, one of the leading names in Brazilian journalism, the mathematician spoke about the satisfaction of being able to maintain this modus operandi throughout his career. Read more: 2024 Retrospective: How much is mathematics worth in Brazil? IMPA hosted 100 international speakers in 2024. 2024 Retrospective: the year is marked by awards. “What really makes us enjoy doing mathematics, I think I speak for most, is very close, fortunately, to what brought us down this path. A mathematician has the opportunity, throughout their career, up to 80 years old, to have the same contact with the work as they did at 20. Nature doesn't change. You don't become a manager who starts bossing people around and stops getting your hands dirty. You continue wanting to do what you've always done.” The interview aired in October and is available on GloboPlay . For the newspaper O Globo, in an interview conducted in Beijing, the researcher revealed that he has intensified his relationship with Chinese researchers and is trying to attract professionals to Brazil. He highlighted the importance of IMPA in his training.

“Staying in Brazil, with excellent researchers, can be more worthwhile than going to a place where you'll just be another competitor. Things worked out better for me doing my doctorate in Brazil than abroad. I started very early, finishing my doctorate at 21. It was important to have support at that time. After my doctorate, I immediately went to France. But I think if I had left earlier, I wouldn't have done so well,” he told the newspaper. For Folha, Avila offered an important and necessary reflection for Brazilian society: “No one should feel proud of not knowing mathematics. The way to remove this impenetrable aura is not to stifle curiosity, but to allow people to explore and play with mathematics, especially from a young age.” Fields Medal The honor was awarded to the IMPA researcher on August 12, 2004. The award was one of the factors that led Brazil to occupy one of the highest rungs of mathematics, Group 5, the elite, comprised of the most advanced countries in the discipline. At 35 years old at the time, Avila was already internationally recognized for his groundbreaking work in dynamical systems, an area of mathematics that studies the evolution of various phenomena over time. The researcher tackled a series of problems that had challenged the scientific community for decades. At the time of the award ceremony, the International Mathematical Union (IMU) highlighted that "Artur Avila works with formidable technical prowess, with the ingenuity and tenacity of a master problem solver, and with an infallible flair for profound and significant questions," the institution announced during a ceremony held in Seoul, South Korea. Also read: In Folha, Viana announces year-end mathematical challenges. 2024 Retrospective: the year is marked by awards.