Caucher Birkar

Caucher Birkar (Kurdish: کۆچەر بیرکار) is a Kurdish mathematician who is currently engaged in research and teaching at the University of Cambridge. In 2010 he received the Leverhulme Prize in mathematics and statistics for his contributions to algebraic geometry. The Leverhulme Prize is given to "outstanding scholars who have made a substantial and recognised contribution to their particular field of study, recognised at an international level, and where the expectation is that their greatest achievement is yet to come".^[1]

Early years and education

He was born in 1978 in Marivan in Iran. Birkar spent his earliest years in Marivan, where he also studied. He moved to Tehran to study mathematics at the University of Tehran, where he received his bachelor's degree. Birkar received his PhD degree at the University of Nottingham, after moving to the United Kingdom.

Research

His main area of interest is algebraic geometry, in particular, birational geometry. Birkar settled the existence of log flips in higher dimensions,^[2] continuing Vyacheslav Shokurov's work. He has, along with several other mathematicians, proved that the canonical ring of a smooth projective variety is finitely generated.^[3] Birkar has also proved that every variety of general type over a field of characteristic zero has a minimal model.^[4]

Awards

• Leverhulme Prize in mathematics and satistics for "his outstanding contributions to fundamental research in algebraic geometry"^[5][6]
• Prize of the mathematics foundation of Paris^[7]

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Caucher Birkar.

• , a list of his research
• The Mathematics Genealogy Project
• Birkar on Journalogy

References