When the Clay Mathematics Institute put individual $1-million prize bounties on seven unsolved mathematical problems, they may have undervalued one entry—by a lot. If mathematicians were to resolve, ...

When computer scientists hang out at cocktail parties, they're apt to chat, among other things, about the single most important unsolved problem in computer science: the question, Does P = NP?

From powering search engines to securing data and optimizing networks, algorithms underpin nearly every aspect of modern technology. Understanding how efficiently they can solve problems — and where ...

Last year, 18 percent of Stanford University seniors graduated with a degree in computer science, more than double the proportion of just a decade earlier. Over the same period at MIT, that rate went ...

Avi Wigderson is the first recipient of both a Turing Award and an Abel Prize, math's top honor. Andrea Kane / Institute for Advanced Study The 2023 Turing Award—the computing world’s Nobel Prize ...

How do you prove something is true? For mathematicians, the answer is simple: Start with some basic assumptions and proceed, step by step, to the conclusion. QED, proof complete. If there’s a mistake ...

One July afternoon in 2024, Ryan Williams set out to prove himself wrong. Two months had passed since he’d hit upon a startling discovery about the relationship between time and memory in computing.

Theoretical computer scientist Manuel Blum has guided generations of graduate students into fruitful careers in the field. Every academic field has its superstars. But a rare few achieve superstardom ...