Peter Scholze - a Fields medal for a true hero of science

It was no surprise. There was no way around a Fields medal for Peter Scholze at this years International Congress of the International Mathematical Union (IMU). His outstanding work on "perfectoid spaces" was on of the great intellectual works of the last decade.

The "Fields Medal" is often referred to as the mathematic"s "Nobel Prize". But this undermines the value of the Fields medal by far:

First of all, the reward is not given by some questionable institution but by the most significant peers in mathematics. Second of all, it is not a life time achievement award. Only those who come up with ground breaking works before they are 40 years of age, can be rewarded. Third of all, up to four medals are given out only every four years. If there has not been outstanding achievements the number of medals are limited.

"We introduce a certain class of so-called perfectoid rings and spaces,which give a natural framework for Faltings’ almost purity theorem, and for which there is a natural tilting operation which exchanges characteristic 0 and characteristic p. We deduce the weight-monodromy conjecture in certain cases by reduction to equal characteristic."

This ist the abstract from Scholze's groundbreaking work. With a personal interested in mathematics, I read a lot about perfectoid spaces and talk with mathematicians about it. Eventhough I am far way from understanding the concept, I learned enough to appreciate the fact, that Schulze opened up a whole new dimension in mathematics.

In times where new ideas are often limited to answering old questions due to more computer power, Scholze's work is purely based on thinking and imagination. His approach of solving mathematical problems is based on his ability to think out of the box. We are all trained to solve a scientific problem by building up a hypothesis and try to proof it. Scholze has been characterized by some of his colleagues, to look at a problem without a preset mind and try to go through all possible answers. This ability makes him the outstanding science figure he is.

Even before the Fields medal, Scholze had offers from basically any elite university in the world. He decided to stay at the University in Bonn, Germany. Other Germans have received the Fields medal before him, but he is the only one ever receiving this honor while working at a German institution. I hope other scientist of his reputation will also be given the work environment they need, to stay in Germany and train the next generation here.

And one last word one of the other Field medal winners - Caucher Birkar: In times of growing nationalism in Great Britain, Europe and other parts of the world, refugees are more and more portrait as a burden, not as a great chance. Caucher Birkar came to Great Britain as a Kurdish refugee, hardly speaking any English at that time. Now he is Great Britain's scientific leader.