December 7, 2015 [TORONTO] The winner of the 2016 CRM - Fields - PIMS Prize is Professor Daniel Wise (McGill University). The announcement was made at the banquet of the 2015 Canadian Mathematical Society (CMS) Winter Meeting in Montreal, Quebec on Sunday, December 6.

Professor Wise is widely recognized as one of the top geometric group theorists in the world. His fundamental research contributions lie at the core of what is widely considered as the most important development in geometry and topology since Perelman's celebrated proof of the Poincaré Conjecture, namely the proof of Thurston's virtually fibered conjecture for hyperbolic three-manifolds. It has also been central to the resolution of major open problems such as Waldhausen's virtual Haken conjecture and Baumslag's famous 1968 conjecture which states that every one-relator group with torsion is residually finite. Over the past 40 years, the works of Thurston and Waldhausen have been central to the development of 3-manifold topology and hyperbolic geometry. The work of Wise followed a totally different direction, which he developed with exceptional insight and virtuosity over more than 15 years, leading to the spectacular results mentioned above.

The profound impact and originality of Wise's work have been recognized through major awards, most notably the Veblen Prize of the American Mathematical Society, which he shared in 2013 with Ian Agol (Berkeley). He delivered an invited address at the 2014 International Congress of Mathematicians in Seoul and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in Canada, also in 2014. 

Dani Wise received his PhD from Princeton in 1996 and, following Postdoctoral positions at Berkeley and Cornell, joined the Mathematics department of McGill in 2001, where he is now James McGill Professor.

About the CRM-Fields-PIMS Prize

The CRM-Fields-PIMS prize has become the premier Canadian award for research achievements in the mathematical sciences. It is awarded jointly by the three Canadian mathematics institutes. The winner receives a monetary award, and an invitation to present a lecture at each institute within one year after the award is announced. 

The prize recognizes exceptional achievement in the mathematical sciences. It was established by the Centre de recherches mathematiques and the Fields Institute as the CRM-Fields prize in 1994. In 2005, PIMS became an equal partner. The name changed to the CRM-Fields-PIMS prize, the award level increased, and the terms of reference were revised. The winner is selected by a committee appointed by the three institutes.

About the Fields Institute
Founded in 1992, the Fields Institute is a leading international research centre located on the campus of the University of Toronto.

The mission of the Institute is to enhance mathematical activity in Canada by bringing together mathematicians from Canada and abroad, and by promoting contact and collaboration between professional mathematicians and the increasing numbers of users of mathematics. Thus the Institute supports research in pure and applied mathematics, statistics and computer science, as well as collaboration between mathematicians and those applying mathematics in areas such as engineering, the physical and biological sciences, medicine, economics and finance, telecommunications and information systems.

Every year, its programs attract more than 4000 participants from around the world. The Institute is supported by the Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the National Science Foundation (US), and a growing list of partner universities and corporations in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

For other news, please visit the Fields Institute press releases page.