Sergey Petrovich Novikov (March 20, 1938, Gorky — June 6, 2024, Moscow) was a Soviet and Russian mathematician specializing in algebraic and differential topology and mathematical physics; Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences (1965), professor (1967), full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1981; corresponding member since 1966) and of the Russian Academy of Sciences (1992). He was born in Gorky — now Nizhny Novgorod. He was a recipient of the Fields Medal (1970), the highest international award in mathematics.[1]
Origins and Education
Novikov was born into a family of mathematicians. His father, Pyotr Sergeyevich Novikov (1901–1975), was a scholar in the fields of set theory, mathematical logic, the theory of algorithms, and group theory, later a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences and a Lenin Prize laureate (1957). His mother, Lyudmila Vsevolodovna Keldysh (1904–1976), was a Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences specializing in geometric topology and set theory; she was the sister of Mstislav Vsevolodovich Keldysh, academician and President of the USSR Academy of Sciences.[1]
In 1955 Novikov graduated from Moscow Secondary School No. 330 and entered the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics at Moscow State University, where he studied algebraic topology under Professor Mikhail Postnikov. After graduating from the university in 1960, he entered the postgraduate program at the Steklov Institute of Mathematics of the USSR Academy of Sciences.[1]
Scientific Work
Novikov played a leading role in the revival of modern topology in the USSR and Russia, and he solved fundamental problems in topology, the theory of nonlinear waves, quantum mechanics, and field theory. He worked as a chief researcher at the Landau Institute for Theoretical Physics and at the Steklov Institute of Mathematics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and was also a distinguished professor at Moscow State University (from 1999). From 1985 to 1996 he headed the Moscow Mathematical Society, and from 2010 he was its honorary president.[1]
Novikov was elected an honorary member of a number of foreign academies: the London Mathematical Society (1987), the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (1988), Academia Europaea (1990), the Italian National Academy (1991), the United States National Academy of Sciences (1994), the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (1996), and the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts (2011).[1]
Awards and Prizes
Novikov was awarded the Lenin Prize in science and technology (1967), the Fields Medal (1970), the Lobachevsky Prize (1981), the Wolf Prize (2005), the Bogolyubov Gold Medal of the Russian Academy of Sciences (2009), and the Leonhard Euler Gold Medal of the Russian Academy of Sciences (2012). In 2020, for his contributions to topology, the theory of nonlinear waves, quantum mechanics, and field theory, he was awarded the Lomonosov Grand Gold Medal — the highest award of the Russian Academy of Sciences.[1]
Nizhny Novgorod Connection
Novikov was born on March 20, 1938, in Gorky (known since 1990 as Nizhny Novgorod). The city became his birthplace, although the mathematician's entire subsequent scientific career was tied to Moscow.[1]
Sources
- cyclowiki.org — Sergey Petrovich Novikov (mathematician) — Cyclopedia