Caucher Birkar

Caucher Birkar
کۆچەر بیرکار
FRS
Born
Fereydoun Derakhshani[1][2]

1978 (age 45–46)
Marivan County, Iran
CitizenshipIran
Alma materUniversity of Tehran (BSc)
University of Nottingham (PhD)
Children1
AwardsLeverhulme Prize (2010)
Moore Prize (2016)
Fields Medal (2018)
Scientific career
Fields
InstitutionsTsinghua University
University of Cambridge
ThesisTopics in Modern Algebraic Geometry (2004)
Doctoral advisor
Websitewww.dpmms.cam.ac.uk/~cb496

Caucher Birkar FRS (Kurdish: کۆچەر بیرکار, romanized: Koçer Bîrkar, lit. 'migrant mathematician'; born Fereydoun Derakhshani (Kurdish: فەرەیدوون درەخشانی، Persian: فریدون درخشانی); July 1978) is an Iranian mathematician[3] and a professor at Tsinghua University.

Birkar is an important contributor to modern birational geometry.[4] In 2010 he received the Leverhulme Prize in mathematics and statistics for his contributions to algebraic geometry,[5] and in 2016, shared the AMS Moore Prize for the article "Existence of minimal models for varieties of log general type".[6] He was awarded the Fields Medal in 2018, "for his proof of boundedness of Fano varieties and contributions to the minimal model program".[7] In his office at the University, Birkar has two photographs of Alexander Grothendieck, his favorite mathematician, who like Birkar, was a refugee and Fields medalist.[8]

Birkar maintains strong ties to his Kurdish heritage and actively encourages Kurdish identity while also separating it from nationalism and politics. According to Birkar, his strong Kurdish identity is not a part of nationalism nor politics and he is not striving for such achievements. [9] This can be a reflection of his name change to Caucher Birkar which roughly translates into ”the Migrating Mathematician”.

  1. ^ "جایزه معادل "نوبل ریاضی" به یک کُرد ایرانی پناهنده به بریتانیا رسید". VoA (in Persian). 1 August 2018.
  2. ^ "چرا مریم میرزاخانی و کوچر بیرکار مهاجرت کردند؟". BBC (in Persian). 3 August 2018.
  3. ^ York, University of. "Professor Caucher Birkar". University of York. Retrieved 8 November 2024. Professor Caucher Birkar is a UK-based Iranian Kurdish mathematician, who won the Fields Medal for his contributions to algebraic geometry in 2018.
  4. ^ "Birkar Citation" (PDF). International Mathematical Union. Birkar long citation. 2018. p. 2.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  5. ^ "Philip Leverhulme Prizes". Archived from the original on 10 June 2013. Retrieved 30 December 2012.
  6. ^ "American Mathematical Society". www.ams.org. Retrieved 1 August 2018.
  7. ^ Davis, Nicola; Zhou, Naaman (1 August 2018). "Former refugee among winners of Fields medal – the 'Nobel prize for maths'". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 January 2021.
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference :1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ "کۆچەر بیرکار یەکێک لە 50 کاریگارترین بیرمەندەکانی جیهان". www.youtube.com. Retrieved 30 October 2024.