Page 59 - 8th European Congress of Mathematics. 20-26 June 2021. Presentation of Plenary, Invited, Public, Abel and Prize Speakers at the 8ECM.
P. 59
Public Lectures
Andrei Okounkov
Columbia University, Skoltech, Higher
School of Economics
Andrei Okounkov is a Russian mathematician who
works in mathematical physics and neighboring
areas of representation theory and algebraic geometry.
Enumerative geometry lies at the crossroads of all these fields of
mathematics, and a lot of Okounkov’s recent work focuses on K-theoretic
generalizations of classical questions in enumerative geometry. In
particular, a K-theoretic generalization of the Donaldson-Thomas-style
counting of curves in algebraic threefolds is an exciting area at the forefront
of current research with a conjectural relation to counting membranes
of M-theory put forward by Nekrasov and Okounkov, and a geometric
representation theory description of its basic building blocks obtained by
Okounkov and A.Smirnov. Earlier conjectures of Maulik-Nekrasov-Okounkov-
Pandharipande connecting cohomological DT counts with Gromov-Witten
theory of algebraic threefolds in many ways shaped the developments of
both fields. The proof of the MNOP conjectures for toric varieties by Maulik-
Oblomkov-Okounkov-Pandharipande, and the work that followed, extends,
among other things, the representation-theoretic understanding of the
Gromov-Witten theory of curves (and also of the point) obtained in the early
2000s by Okounkov and Pandharipande.
In 2004, Okounkov was awarded an EMS prize for work that “contributed
greatly to the field of asymptotic combinatorics.” In 2006, at the 25th
International Congress of Mathematicians in Madrid, Spain, he received the
Fields Medal “for his contributions to bridging probability, representation
theory and algebraic geometry.”
Andrei Okounkov is a professor at the Columbia University in the city of New
55
Andrei Okounkov
Columbia University, Skoltech, Higher
School of Economics
Andrei Okounkov is a Russian mathematician who
works in mathematical physics and neighboring
areas of representation theory and algebraic geometry.
Enumerative geometry lies at the crossroads of all these fields of
mathematics, and a lot of Okounkov’s recent work focuses on K-theoretic
generalizations of classical questions in enumerative geometry. In
particular, a K-theoretic generalization of the Donaldson-Thomas-style
counting of curves in algebraic threefolds is an exciting area at the forefront
of current research with a conjectural relation to counting membranes
of M-theory put forward by Nekrasov and Okounkov, and a geometric
representation theory description of its basic building blocks obtained by
Okounkov and A.Smirnov. Earlier conjectures of Maulik-Nekrasov-Okounkov-
Pandharipande connecting cohomological DT counts with Gromov-Witten
theory of algebraic threefolds in many ways shaped the developments of
both fields. The proof of the MNOP conjectures for toric varieties by Maulik-
Oblomkov-Okounkov-Pandharipande, and the work that followed, extends,
among other things, the representation-theoretic understanding of the
Gromov-Witten theory of curves (and also of the point) obtained in the early
2000s by Okounkov and Pandharipande.
In 2004, Okounkov was awarded an EMS prize for work that “contributed
greatly to the field of asymptotic combinatorics.” In 2006, at the 25th
International Congress of Mathematicians in Madrid, Spain, he received the
Fields Medal “for his contributions to bridging probability, representation
theory and algebraic geometry.”
Andrei Okounkov is a professor at the Columbia University in the city of New
55
