Michel Talagrand achieved ‘Abel Prize’ 2024 , one of the most prestigious awards of this planet, specially in the field of Mathematics. The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters awarded the prize to this eminent Mathematician of French National Centre for Scientific Research ( CNRS ), Paris, France .He achieved the honour for his contributions to probability theory and functional analysis , with outstanding applications in Mathematics and Statistics .” His work helps others to tackle problems related to random processes.
The prize was given for three specific areas of his work –
1 . Suprema of stochastic processes – A stochastic process produces a sequence of random values and the Supremum is the largest value to be expected from a collection of those values . If the height of waves crashing on a beach is a stochastic process , it is useful to know what the largest wave to hit the beach next year is likely to be .
2. Concentration of measures – Counterintuitively, when a process depends on a range of different sources of randomness , instead of getting more complicated, it is possible for different random factors to compensate for each other and produce more predictable results. He has provided sharp quantitative estimates for this.
3. Spin glass – It is a special form of matter that atoms can arrange themselves in, much to the initial surprise of physicists. Talagrand used his knowledge of Statistics and probability to prove limits on how spin glass matter can behave, and thereby completed the proof of Giorgio Parisi’s Nobel Prize winning work ( 2021 )
