Terence Chi-Shen Tao was born on 17 July 1975 in Adelaide, South Australia.
Terence Chi-Shen Tao was born on 17 July 1975 in Adelaide, South Australia. ◦ He is an Australian and American mathematician and a professor of mathematics at UCLA, where he holds the James and Carol Collins Chair. ◦ He was awarded the Fields Medal in 2006 for his contributions to partial differential equations, combinatorics, harmonic analysis, and additive number theory. ◦ A child prodigy, Tao attended university-level mathematics courses at age 9 and scored 760 on the SAT math section while eight years old. ◦ He was the youngest participant in the International Mathematical Olympiad and remains the youngest winner of its bronze, silver, and gold medals. ◦ He joined the UCLA faculty in 1996 and was promoted to full professor in 1999 at age 24, remaining the youngest person ever appointed to that rank by the institution. ◦ He became known for fruitful collaborations across multiple specializations, co-authoring with over 30 researchers by 2006 and reaching 68 co-authors by October 2015. ◦ Tao rejects the notion that mathematics is reserved for geniuses and dislikes being called "the Mozart of math". ◦ He says his insights arrive, when they do, after much hard work, from reading, from other mathematicians, and from taking long walks. ◦
Tao wrote that obtaining a solution is only the short-term goal of solving a mathematical problem, and that the long-term goal is to increase your understanding of a subject. ◦ He adds that if you cannot adequately explain the solution of a problem to a classmate, then you haven't really understood the solution yourself. ◦ He finds that "playing" with a problem, even after you have solved it, is very helpful for understanding the underlying mechanism of the solution better, and that one can try removing some hypotheses or trying to prove a stronger conclusion. ◦ He stresses that one should value partial progress on a problem as a stepping stone to a complete solution. ◦ He notes that later in a research career, problems are mainly solved by knowledge of your own field and of other fields, experience, patience and hard work, but that competition problems require a slightly different set of problem solving skills. ◦ In his book written at age 15, he proposed that a solution should be relatively short, understandable, and hopefully have a touch of elegance, and that it should be fun to discover. ◦ He rejects the notion that mathematics is reserved for geniuses. ◦ He believes mathematicians have a bit more of an obligation than poets because they receive more federal funding, so they cannot say they pursue something solely for its artistic value, and he describes what they do as basic research. ◦ He observes that in math, failure is very cheap, and that no one gets hurt or dies when a problem is not solved. ◦ He finds that the most interesting problems are not the famously hopeless ones, but those where existing techniques can do about 90% of the work and one only needs to solve the remaining 10%. ◦ He views AI as reshaping the human scientific paradigm and believes it will become an important partner for exploring mathematics and physics, though it cannot replace human intuition and creativity. ◦
Tao is known for fruitful collaborations across multiple specializations and has built a wide network of co-authors. ◦ He learned problem-solving skills from Polya's classic "How to Solve It" while competing at the Mathematics Olympiads. ◦ His approach includes understanding the problem, understanding the data, understanding the objective, selecting good notation, and writing down everything you know. ◦ When stuck on the Green-Tao theorem, he and Ben Green took Szemeredi's theorem and "goosed it" until it concerned primes, and whenever they got stuck there was always an idea from one of the four proofs that they could somehow shoehorn into their argument. ◦ His insights arrive after much hard work, from reading, from other mathematicians, and from taking long walks. ◦ He began his work on compressed sensing in conversation with Emmanuel Candes at their children's preschool drop-off. ◦ He prefers problems where existing techniques can do about 90% of the work, leaving only 10% to solve. ◦
Tao distinguishes between the short-term goal of obtaining a solution and the long-term goal of increasing understanding. ◦ He treats partial progress as a stepping stone rather than a failure. ◦ He advocates "playing" with a solved problem by removing hypotheses or trying to prove a stronger conclusion to better understand the underlying mechanism. ◦ He uses the "spherical cow" metaphor, in which unrealistic assumptions like a frictionless sphere serve as a good starting point for understanding reality. ◦ He sees AI as a partner that enables more experiments in mathematics, not just theories, while maintaining that human intuition and creativity remain irreplaceable. ◦
His contributions span partial differential equations, combinatorics, harmonic analysis, and additive number theory. ◦ With Ben Green, he proved the Green-Tao theorem, which states that there are arbitrarily long arithmetic progressions of prime numbers. ◦ His work on compressed sensing has been adapted for faster MRI scans and cellphone cameras. ◦ He has proved many results related to prime numbers, though not the twin prime conjecture. ◦
Tao writes career-advice essays and shares strategies on his blog. ◦ He uses accessible metaphors such as the "spherical cow" to explain how mathematicians simplify reality. ◦ He employs informal language in describing his work, such as saying he and Ben Green "goosed" a theorem and would "shoehorn" ideas into their argument. ◦ He explains mathematical concepts on podcasts and in public interviews. ◦
Despite being a celebrated child prodigy and Fields Medalist, Tao rejects the notion that mathematics is reserved for geniuses and dislikes being called "the Mozart of math". ◦ He identifies with the Salieri character in *Amadeus*, describing him as someone with enough talent to recognize genius but not enough to be one, and says all academics feel for that character. ◦ When selected as an inaugural 2014 Breakthrough Prize laureate, he felt himself unqualified and unsuccessfully argued that the prize money be distributed among more researchers instead. ◦ He acknowledges that mathematicians have more obligation than poets because of federal funding, yet he pursues basic research that may not have immediate real-world applications. ◦ He has proved many results related to prime numbers but has not proved the twin prime conjecture, which he says he would most love to have. ◦
Mathematicians now compete to interest him in their problems, and he has become a kind of Mr. Fix-it for frustrated researchers. ◦ He is open to collaborations across specializations and maintains a wide network of co-authors. ◦ He values explaining solutions clearly enough that a classmate could understand them, treating this as the standard for true comprehension. ◦ He suggests continuing to "play" with a problem after it is solved by removing hypotheses or strengthening the conclusion. ◦ He finds that insights come from hard work, reading, conversations with other mathematicians, and taking long walks. ◦ He is receptive to ideas from other fields and informal settings, as evidenced by his work on compressed sensing beginning at a preschool drop-off conversation. ◦