IMU Awards, Prizes, and Special Lectures
The scientific prizes of the International Mathematical Union of the year 2010 have been awarded during the Opening Ceremony of ICM 2010 in Hyderabad, India on August 19, 2010. Shrimati Pratibha Patil, the Honourable President of India, has given away the awards (a medal and a cheque for each of the prize winners). Information about the 2010 winners can be found here. The slides (PowerPoint & PDF) contain the citations as well as the names of the members of the various Prize Committees. A video of the Opening Ceremony can be found at the ICM 2010 online streaming archive.
The International Mathematical Union grants four Prizes:
IMU Prizes are awarded every four years at the Opening Ceremony of the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM). The Fields Medal recognizes outstanding mathematical achievement. The Rolf Nevanlinna Prize honors distinguished achievements in mathematical aspects of information science. The Carl Friedrich Gauss Prize is awarded for outstanding mathematical contributions that have found significant applications outside of mathematics. The Chern Medal is awarded to an individual whose accomplishments warrant the highest level of recognition for outstanding achievements in the field of mathematics.
The Fields Medal was first awarded in 1936, the Rolf Nevanlinna Prize in 1982, and the Carl Friedrich Gauss Prize in 2006. The Chern Medal is new, it is awarded for the first time in 2010.
About two years in advance of an award, the IMU Executive Committee appoints, for each of its Prizes, a Selection Committee along the lines of the Prize Statutes and the IMU By-Laws. This includes specifications about the criteria of selection and instructions how to act in a conflict of interest.
Selection Committees for the IMU Prizes
Nomination
Fields Medal
Rolf Nevanlinna Prize
Carl Friedrich Gauss Prize
Chern Medal Award
The Chern Medal Award is a new prize. It was awarded, jointly with the Chern Medal Foundation (CMF), for the first time at the opening ceremony of ICM 2010.
ICM Lectures
Although formally not an award, an invitation to speak at an International Congress of Mathematicians is viewed in the mathematical world as an outstanding honor. At each of today's ICMs about 20 plenary and 160 invited lectures are presented. The speakers are selected by a program committee of about 10 members with the support of section panels. The number of mathematician involved in the selection process roughly equals the number of speakers. Each ICM features also special lectures (e.g., by prize winners or honoring prize winners). Since 1994, the ICM Emmy Noether Lecture is a special lecture which has its own selection committee.
Other Prizes and Awards in which IMU plays an Institutional Role
There are several other prestigious awards worldwide that recognize mathematicians and their work, and that are appreciated and celebrated by the whole mathematical community, including the IMU. We mention here in particular those in which the IMU plays an institutional role:
The Abel Prize
The Abel Prize is awarded by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.
IMU nominates members of The Abel Committee:
The Ramanujan Prize
A new Prize for young mathematicians from developing countries has been created in the name of Srinivasa Ramanujan by the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), in cooperation with IMU, who nominate members of the Prize Committee. The Prize money is donated by the Niels Henrik Abel Memorial Fund
The Prize will be awarded annually to a researcher from a developing country less than 45 years of age at the time of the award, who has conducted outstanding research in a developing country.
