Leroy P. Steele Prize
Awarded every year by the American Mathematical Society
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Leroy P. Steele Prizes are awarded every year by the American Mathematical Society, for distinguished research work and writing in the field of mathematics. Since 1993, there has been a formal division into three categories.
The prizes have been given since 1970, from a bequest of Leroy P. Steele, and were set up in honor of George David Birkhoff, William Fogg Osgood and William Caspar Graustein. The way the prizes are awarded was changed in 1976 and 1993, but the initial aim of honoring expository writing as well as research has been retained. The prizes of $5,000 are not given on a strict national basis, but relate to mathematical activity in the USA, and writing in English (originally, or in translation).
Steele Prize for Lifetime Achievement
- 2026 H. Blaine Lawson
- 2025 Dusa McDuff
- 2024 Haïm Brezis
- 2023 Nicholas M. Katz
- 2022 Richard P. Stanley
- 2021 Spencer Bloch
- 2020 Karen Uhlenbeck
- 2019 Jeff Cheeger
- 2018 Jean Bourgain
- 2017 James G. Arthur
- 2016 Barry Simon
- 2015 Victor Kac
- 2014 Phillip A. Griffiths
- 2013 Yakov G. Sinai
- 2012 Ivo M. Babuška
- 2011 John W. Milnor
- 2010 William Fulton
- 2009 Luis Caffarelli
- 2008 George Lusztig
- 2007 Henry P. McKean
- 2006 Frederick W. Gehring, Dennis P. Sullivan
- 2005 Israel M. Gelfand
- 2004 Cathleen Synge Morawetz
- 2003 Ronald Graham, Victor Guillemin
- 2002 Michael Artin, Elias Stein
- 2001 Harry Kesten
- 2000 Isadore M. Singer
- 1999 Richard V. Kadison
- 1998 Nathan Jacobson
- 1997 Ralph S. Phillips
- 1996 Goro Shimura
- 1995 John T. Tate
- 1994 Louis Nirenberg
- 1993 Eugene B. Dynkin
Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition
| Year | Prizewinner | Citation |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Michael E. Taylor | for his fundamental treatise "Partial Differential Equations, Volumes I-III," published in 1996 as volumes 115-117 of Springer Verlag's Applied Mathematical Sciences series.[1] |
| 2025 | James S. Milne | for his extensive corpus of excellent expository works provided on his website.[2] |
| 2024 | Benson Farb and Dan Margalit | for their book A Primer on Mapping Class Groups.[3] |
| 2023 | Lawrence C. Evans | for his book Partial Differential Equations.[4] |
| 2022 | Aise Johan de Jong | for being the originator and maintainer of the Stacks Project. |
| 2021 | Noga Alon and Joel H. Spencer | for their book The Probabilistic Method.[5] |
| 2020 | Martin R. Bridson and André Haefliger | for their book Metric Spaces of Non-Positive Curvature.[6] |
| 2019 | Philippe Flajolet (posthumously) and Robert Sedgewick | for their book Analytic Combinatorics,[7] an authoritative and highly accessible compendium of its subject, which demonstrates the deep interface between combinatorial mathematics and classical analysis. |
| 2018 | Martin Aigner and Günter M. Ziegler | for their book Proofs from THE BOOK.[8] |
| 2017 | Dusa McDuff and Dietmar Salamon | for their book J-holomorphic Curves and Symplectic Topology.[9] |
| 2016 | David A. Cox, John Little and Donal O'Shea | for their book Ideals, Varieties, and Algorithms,[10] which has made algebraic geometry and computational commutative algebra accessible not just to mathematicians but to students and researchers in many fields. |
| 2015 | Robert Lazarsfeld | for his books Positivity in Algebraic Geometry I and II,[11][12] published in 2004. These books were instant classics that have profoundly influenced and shaped research in algebraic geometry over the past decade. |
| 2014 | Yuri Burago, Dmitri Burago, Sergei Ivanov | for their book A Course in Metric Geometry,[13] in recognition of excellence in exposition and promotion of fruitful ideas in geometry. |
| 2013 | John Guckenheimer, Philip Holmes | in recognition of their book Nonlinear Oscillations, Dynamical Systems, and Bifurcations of Vector Fields.[14] |
| 2012 | Michael Aschbacher, Richard Lyons, Stephen D. Smith, Ronald Solomon | for their work The Classification of Finite Simple Groups: Groups of Characteristic 2 Type.[15] |
| 2011 | Henryk Iwaniec | for his long record of excellent exposition, both in books and in classroom notes. |
| 2010 | David Eisenbud | for his book Commutative Algebra with a View Toward Algebraic Geometry.[16] |
| 2009 | I. G. Macdonald | for his book Symmetric Functions and Hall Polynomials.[17] |
| 2008 | Neil Trudinger | for his book Elliptic Partial Differential Equations of Second Order,[18] written with the late David Gilbarg. |
| 2007 | David Mumford | for his beautiful expository accounts of a host of aspects of algebraic geometry, including The Red Book of Varieties and Schemes.[19] |
| 2006 | Lars Hörmander | for his book The Analysis of Linear Partial Differential Operators.[20][21][22][23] |
| 2005 | Branko Grünbaum | for his book Convex Polytopes.[24] |
| 2004 | John Milnor | in recognition of a lifetime of expository contributions ranging across a wide spectrum of disciplines including topology, symmetric bilinear forms, characteristic classes, Morse theory, game theory, algebraic K-theory, iterated rational maps... and the list goes on. |
| 2003 | John B. Garnett | for his book Bounded Analytic Functions.[25] |
| 2002 | Yitzhak Katznelson | for his book An Introduction to Harmonic Analysis.[26] |
| 2001 | Richard Stanley | in recognition of the completion of his two-volume work Enumerative Combinatorics. |
| 2000 | John H. Conway | in recognition of his many expository contributions in automata, the theory of games, lattices, coding theory, group theory, and quadratic forms. |
| 1999 | Serge Lang | for his many mathematics books. Among Lang's most famous texts are Algebra[27] and Algebraic Number Theory.[28] |
| 1998 | Joseph H. Silverman | for his books The Arithmetic of Elliptic Curves[29] and Advanced Topics in the Arithmetic of Elliptic Curves.[30] |
| 1997 | Anthony W. Knapp | for his book Representation Theory of Semisimple Groups,[31] a beautifully written book which starts from scratch but takes the reader far into a highly developed subject. |
| 1996 | Bruce Berndt | for the four volumes, Ramanujan's Notebooks, parts I, II, III, and IV.[32][33][34][35] |
| 1996 | William Fulton | for his book Intersection Theory.[36] |
| 1995 | Jean-Pierre Serre | for his 1970 book Cours d'Arithmétique,[37] with its English translation, published in 1973 by Springer Verlag, A Course in Arithmetic.[38] |
| 1994 | Ingrid Daubechies | for her book Ten Lectures on Wavelets.[39] |
| 1993 | Walter Rudin | for his books Principles of Mathematical Analysis[40] and Real and Complex Analysis.[41] |
Steele Prize for Seminal Contribution to Research
More information In these papers he showed for the first time how to use the powerful tools of probability theory to attack the hard analytic questions of constructive quantum field theory, controlling renormalizations with 
...
...| Year | Prizewinner | Citation |
|---|---|---|
| 2026[42] | László Erdős, Benjamin Schlein, and Horng-Tzer Yau | for their three papers "Semicircle law on short scales and delocalization of eigenvectors for Wigner random matrices",[43] "Local semicircle law and complete delocalization for Wigner random matrices",[44] and "Universality of random matrices and local relaxation flow".[45] |
| 2025 | Kenneth A. Ribet | for his paper "A modular construction of unramified p-extensions of Q(μp)".[46] |
| 2024 | József Balogh, Robert Morris, and Wojciech Samotij | for their paper "Independent sets in hypergraphs".[47] |
| David Saxton and Andrew Thomason | for their paper "Hypergraph containers".[48] | |
| 2023 | Peter B. Kronheimer and Tomasz S. Mrowka | for their paper "Gauge theory for embedded surfaces, I".[49] |
| 2022 | Michel Goemans and David P. Williamson | for their paper "Improved approximation algorithms for maximum cut and satisfiability problems using semidefinite programming".[50] |
| 2021 | Murray Gerstenhaber | for his two papers "The cohomology structure of an associative ring"[51] and "On the deformation of rings and algebras".[52] |
| 2020 | Craig Tracy and Harold Widom | for their paper "Level-spacing distributions and the Airy kernel".[53] |
| 2019 | Haruzo Hida | for his highly original paper "Galois representations into GL2(Zp[[X]]) attached to ordinary cusp forms".[54] |
| 2018 | Sergey Fomin, Andrei Zelevinsky | for their paper "Cluster algebras I: Foundations".[55] |
| 2017 | Leon Simon | for his fundamental contributions to geometric analysis and, in particular, for his paper "Asymptotics for a class of non-linear evolution equations, with applications to geometric problems".[56] |
| 2016 | Andrew Majda | for his monographs "The existence of multidimensional shock fronts"[57] and "The stability of multidimensional shock fronts".[58] |
| 2015 | Rostislav Grigorchuk | for his influential paper "Degrees of growth of finitely generated groups and the theory of invariant means",[59] which appeared in Russian in 1984[60] and in English translation a year later. The paper stands as a landmark in the development of the now-burgeoning area of geometric group theory. |
| 2014 | Luis Caffarelli, Robert Kohn and Louis Nirenberg | for their paper "Partial regularity of suitable weak solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations".[61] |
| 2013 | Saharon Shelah | for his book Classification Theory and the Number of Non-Isomorphic Models.[62] |
| 2012 | William Thurston | for his contributions to low dimensional topology, and in particular for a series of highly original papers, starting with "Hyperbolic structures on 3-manifolds. I. Deformation of acylindrical manifolds",[63] that revolutionized 3-manifold theory. |
| 2011 | Ingrid Daubechies | for her paper, "Orthonormal bases of compactly supported wavelets".[64] |
| 2010 | Robert Griess | for his construction of the "monster" sporadic finite simple group, which he first announced in "A construction of F1 as automorphisms of a 196,883-dimensional algebra"[65] with details published in "The friendly giant".[66] |
| 2009 | Richard S. Hamilton | for his paper "Three-manifolds with positive Ricci curvature".[67] |
| 2008 | Endre Szemerédi | for his paper "On sets of integers containing no k elements in arithmetic progression".[68] |
| 2007 | Karen Uhlenbeck | for her foundational contributions in analytic aspects of mathematical gauge theory. These results appeared in the two papers "Removable singularities in Yang-Mills fields"[69] and "Connections with Lp bounds on curvature".[70] |
| 2006 | Clifford S. Gardner, John M. Greene, Martin D. Kruskal, Robert M. Miura | for their paper "Korteweg-deVries equation and generalizations. VI. Methods for exact solution".[71] |
| 2005 | Robert P. Langlands | for his paper "Problems in the theory of automorphic forms".[72] This is the paper that introduced what are now known as the Langlands conjectures. |
| 2004 | Lawrence C. Evans and Nicolai V. Krylov | for the "Evans-Krylov theorem" as established in the papers "Classical solutions of fully nonlinear convex, second order elliptic equations"[73] and "Boundedly inhomogeneous elliptic and parabolic equations", first published in Russian[74] then translated into English.[75] |
| 2003 | Ronald Jensen and Michael Morley | to Ronald Jensen for his paper "The fine structure of the constructible hierarchy",[76] and to Michael Morley for his paper "Categoricity in power".[77] |
| 2002 | Mark Goresky and Robert MacPherson | for their papers "Intersection homology theory"[78] and "Intersection homology II".[79] |
| 2001 | Leslie F. Greengard and Vladimir Rokhlin | for their paper "A fast algorithm for particle simulations".[80] |
| 2000 | Barry Mazur | for his paper "Modular curves and the Eisenstein ideal".[81] |
| 1999 | Michael G. Crandall | for two seminal papers: "Viscosity solutions of Hamilton-Jacobi equations"[82] (joint with Pierre-Louis Lions) and "Generation of semi-groups of nonlinear transformations on general Banach spaces"[83] (joint with Thomas M. Liggett). |
| 1999 | John F. Nash | for his remarkable paper "The imbedding problem for Riemannian manifolds".[84] |
| 1998 | Herbert Wilf and Doron Zeilberger | for their paper "Rational functions certify combinatorial identities".[85] |
| 1997 | Mikhail Gromov | for his paper "Pseudo holomorphic curves in symplectic manifolds",[86] which revolutionized the subject of symplectic geometry and topology and is central to much current research activity, including quantum cohomology and mirror symmetry. |
| 1996 | Daniel Stroock and S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan | for their four papers "Diffusion processes with continuous coefficients I, II"[87][88], "On the support of diffusion processes with applications to the strong maximum principle",[89] "Diffusion processes with boundary conditions",[90] and their book Multidimensional Diffusion Processes.[91] |
| 1995 | Edward Nelson | for the following two papers in mathematical physics characterized by leaders of the field as extremely innovative: "A quartic interaction in two dimensions"[92] and "Construction of quantum fields from Markoff fields".[93] In these papers he showed for the first time how to use the powerful tools of probability theory to attack the hard analytic questions of constructive quantum field theory, controlling renormalizations with estimates in the first paper, and in the second turning Euclidean quantum field theory into a subset of the theory of stochastic processes. |
| 1994 | Louis de Branges | for his proof of the Bieberbach conjecture.[94] |
| 1993 | George Daniel Mostow | for his book Strong Rigidity of Locally Symmetric Spaces.[95] |
Leroy P. Steele Prizes awarded prior to 1993
| Year | Prizewinner | Citation |
|---|---|---|
| 1992 | Jacques Dixmier | for his books Algèbres de von Neumann (von Neumann Algebras),[96] Les C*-algèbres et leurs représentations (C*-Algebras and Their Representations),[97] and Algèbres enveloppantes (Enveloping Algebras).[98] |
| James Glimm | for his paper "Solutions in the large for nonlinear hyperbolic systems of conservation laws".[99] | |
| Peter Lax | for his numerous and fundamental contributions to the theory and applications of linear and nonlinear partial differential equations and functional analysis, for his leadership in the development of computational and applied mathematics, and for his extraordinary impact as a teacher. | |
| 1991 | Jean-François Trèves | for Introduction to Pseudodifferential and Fourier Integral Operators, volumes I and II.[100][101] |
| Eugenio Calabi | for his fundamental work on global differential geometry, especially complex differential geometry. | |
| Armand Borel | for his extensive contributions in geometry and topology, the theory of Lie groups, their lattices and representations and the theory of automorphic forms, the theory of algebraic groups and their representations and extensive organizational and educational efforts to develop and disseminate modern mathematics. | |
| 1990 | R. D. Richtmyer | for his book Difference Methods for Initial-Value Problems [102] (second edition with K. W. Morton). |
| Bertram Kostant | for his paper "On the existence and irreducibility of certain series of representations".[103] | |
| Raoul Bott | for having been instrumental in changing the face of geometry and topology, with his incisive contributions to characteristic classes, K-theory, index theory, and many other tools of modern mathematics. | |
| 1989 | Daniel Gorenstein | for his book Finite Simple Groups, An Introduction to Their Classification[104] and his two survey articles "The classification of finite simple groups"[105] and "Classifying the finite simple groups".[106] |
| Alberto Calderón | for his paper "Uniqueness in the Cauchy problem for partial differential equations".[107] | |
| Irving Kaplansky | for his lasting impact on mathematics, particularly mathematics in America. By his energetic example, his enthusiastic exposition, and his overall generosity, he has made striking changes in mathematics and has inspired generations of younger mathematicians. | |
| 1988 | Sigurður Helgason | for his books Differential Geometry and Symmetric Spaces,[108] Differential Geometry, Lie Groups, and Symmetric Spaces,[109] and Groups and Geometric Analysis.[110] |
| Gian-Carlo Rota | for his paper "On the foundations of combinatorial theory I. Theory of Möbius Functions".[111] | |
| Deane Montgomery | for his lasting impact on mathematics, particularly mathematics in America. He is one of the founders of the modern theory of transformation groups and is particularly known for his contributions to the solution of Hilbert's fifth problem. | |
| 1987 | Martin Gardner | for his many books and articles on mathematics and particularly for his column "Mathematical Games" in Scientific American. |
| Herbert Federer and Wendell Fleming | for their pioneering paper "Normal and integral currents".[112] | |
| Samuel Eilenberg | for his fundamental contributions to topology and algebra, in particular for his classic papers on singular homology and his work on axiomatic homology theory which had a profound influence on the development of algebraic topology. | |
| 1986 | Donald E. Knuth | for his expository work, The Art of Computer Programming, 3 Volumes (1st Edition 1968, 2nd Edition 1973). |
| Rudolf E. Kálmán | for his two fundamental papers, "A new approach to linear filtering and prediction problems"[113] and "Mathematical description of linear dynamical systems",[114] and for his contribution to a third paper, "New results in linear filtering and prediction theory"[115] (with Richard S. Bucy). | |
| Saunders Mac Lane | for his many contributions to algebra and algebraic topology, and in particular for his pioneering work in homological and categorical algebra. | |
| 1985 | Michael Spivak | for his five-volume set, "A Comprehensive Introduction to Differential Geometry" (second edition, Publish or Perish, 1979). |
| Robert Steinberg | for three papers on various aspects of the theory of algebraic groups: "Representations of algebraic groups",[116] "Regular elements of semisimple algebraic groups",[117] and Endomorphisms of Linear Algebraic Groups.[118] | |
| Hassler Whitney | for his fundamental work on geometric problems, particularly in the general theory of manifolds, in the study of differentiable functions on closed sets, in geometric integration theory, and in the geometry of the tangents to a singular analytic space. | |
| 1984 | Elias M. Stein | for his book Singular Integrals and the Differentiability Properties of Functions.[119] |
| Lennart Carleson | for his papers "An interpolation problem for bounded analytic functions",[120] "Interpolation by bounded analytic functions and the Corona problem",[121] and "On convergence and growth of partial sums of Fourier series".[122] | |
| Joseph L. Doob | for his fundamental work in establishing probability as a branch of mathematics and for his continuing profound influence on its development. | |
| 1983 | Paul R. Halmos | for his many graduate texts in mathematics and for his articles on how to write, talk and publish mathematics. |
| Stephen Cole Kleene | for three important papers which formed the basis for later developments in generalized recursion theory and descriptive set theory: "Arithmetical predicates and function quantifiers"[123], "On the forms of the predicates in the theory of constructive ordinals (second paper)",[124] and "Hierarchies of number-theoretic predicates".[125] | |
| Shiing-Shen Chern | for the cumulative influence of his total mathematical work, high level of research over a period of time, particular influence on the development of the field of differential geometry, and influence on mathematics through Ph.D. students. | |
| 1982 | Lars Ahlfors | for his expository work in Complex Analysis,[126] and in Lectures on Quasiconformal Mappings[127] and Conformal Invariants.[128] |
| Tsit Yuen Lam | for his expository work in his book Algebraic Theory of Quadratic Forms,[129] and four of his papers: "K0 and K1 — an introduction to algebraic K-theory",[130] Ten lectures on quadratic forms over fields (1977), Serre's Conjecture,[131] and "The theory of ordered fields".[132] | |
| John W. Milnor | for a paper of fundamental and lasting importance, "On manifolds homeomorphic to the 7-sphere".[133] | |
| Fritz John | for the cumulative influence of his total mathematical work, high level of research over a period of time, particular influence on the development of a field, and influence on mathematics through Ph.D. students. | |
| 1981 | Oscar Zariski | for his work in algebraic geometry, especially his fundamental contributions to the algebraic foundations of this subject. |
| Eberhard Hopf | for three papers of fundamental and lasting importance: "Abzweigung einer periodischen Lösung von einer stationären Lösung eines Differential systems",[134][135] "A mathematical example displaying features of turbulence"[136] and "The partial differential equation ut + uux = μxx".[137] | |
| Nelson Dunford and Jacob T. Schwartz | for their three-volume expository book, Linear Operators.[138][139][140] | |
| 1980 | André Weil | for the total effect of his work on the general course of twentieth century mathematics, especially in the many areas in which he has made fundamental contributions. |
| Harold M. Edwards | for mathematical exposition in his books Riemann's Zeta Function[141] and Fermat's Last Theorem.[142] | |
| Gerhard Hochschild | for his significant work in homological algebra and its applications. | |
| 1979 | Antoni Zygmund | for his cumulative influence on the theory of Fourier series, real variables, and related areas of analysis. |
| Robin Hartshorne[143] | for his expository research article "Equivalence relations on algebraic cycles and subvarieties of small codimension"[144] and his book Algebraic Geometry.[145] | |
| Joseph J. Kohn | for his fundamental papers "Harmonic integrals on strongly pseudo-convex manifolds I, II".[146][147] | |
| Salomon Bochner | for his cumulative influence on the fields of probability theory, Fourier analysis, several complex variables, and differential geometry. | |
| Hans Lewy | for three fundamental papers: "On the local character of the solutions of an atypical linear differential equation in three variables and a related theorem for regular functions of two complex variables",[148] "An example of a smooth linear partial differential equation without solution",[149] and "On hulls of holomorphy".[150] | |
| 1975 | George W. Mackey | for his paper "Ergodic theory and its significance for statistical mechanics and probability theory".[151] |
| H. Blaine Lawson | for his paper "Foliations".[152] | |
| Lipman Bers | for his paper "Uniformization, moduli, and Kleinian groups".[153] | |
| Martin Davis | for his paper "Hilbert's tenth problem is unsolvable".[154] | |
| Joseph L. Taylor | for his paper Measure Algebras.[155] | |
| 1972 | Edward B. Curtis | for his paper "Simplicial homotopy theory".[156] |
| William J. Ellison | for his paper "Waring's problem".[157] | |
| Lawrence E. Payne[158] | for his paper "Isoperimetric inequalities and their applications".[159] | |
| Dana S. Scott | for his paper "A proof of the independence of the continuum hypothesis".[160] | |
| 1971 | James B. Carrell | for his paper, written jointly with Jean Dieudonné, "Invariant theory, old and new".[161] |
| Jean Dieudonné | for his paper "Algebraic geometry"[162] and for his paper, written jointly with James B. Carrell, "Invariant theory, old and new".[161] | |
| Phillip A. Griffiths | for his paper "Periods of integrals on algebraic manifolds".[163] | |
| 1970 | Solomon Lefschetz | for his paper "A page of mathematical autobiography".[164] |
![{\displaystyle \operatorname {GL} _{2}(\mathbb {Z} _{p}[[X]])}](http://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/media/math/render/svg/c2c2359c0c7d31006094f205ffa6d433e90da8d5)