The Fields Medal is presented annually to young mathematicians who show great achievements in the discipline, according to congress officials, and is considered the “Nobel Prize” of the mathematics field.įreedman, the Charles Lee Powell Professor of Mathematics at UCSD, is known the world over for his work in the little understood area of four-dimensional spaces, an ethereal part of topology and geometry. Michael Freedman at the annual conference of the International Congress of Mathematicians in Berkeley.

The world’s most prestigious award in mathematics was awarded Sunday to UC San Diego Prof.