The Wolf Prize in Mathematics is awarded almost annually by the Wolf Foundation in Israel. It is one of the six Wolf Prizes established by the Foundation and awarded since 1978; the others are in Agriculture, Chemistry, Medicine, Physics and Arts. The Wolf Prize includes a monetary award of $100,000.[1]
According to a reputation survey conducted in 2013 and 2014, the Wolf Prize in Mathematics is the third most prestigious international academic award in mathematics, after the Abel Prize and the Fields Medal.[2] [3]
| Year | Name | Nationality | Citation |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1978 | Israel Gelfand | for his work in functional analysis, group representation, and for his seminal contributions to many areas of mathematics and its applications. | |
| Carl L. Siegel | for his contributions to the theory of numbers, theory of several complex variables, and celestial mechanics. | ||
| 1979 | Jean Leray | for pioneering work on the development and application of topological methods to the study of differential equations. | |
| André Weil | for his inspired introduction of algebraic-geometric methods to the theory of numbers. | ||
| 1980 | Henri Cartan | for pioneering work in algebraic topology, complex variables, homological algebra and inspired leadership of a generation of mathematicians. | |
| Andrey Kolmogorov | for deep and original discoveries in Fourier analysis, probability theory, ergodic theory and dynamical systems. | ||
| 1981 | Lars Ahlfors | for seminal discoveries and the creation of powerful new methods in geometric function theory. | |
| Oscar Zariski | creator of the modern approach to algebraic geometry, by its fusion with commutative algebra. | ||
| 1982 | Hassler Whitney | for his fundamental work in algebraic topology, differential geometry and differential topology. | |
| Mark Krein | for his fundamental contributions to functional analysis and its applications. | ||
| 1983/84 | Shiing-Shen Chern | | for outstanding contributions to global differential geometry, which have profoundly influenced all mathematics. |
| Paul Erdős | for his numerous contributions to number theory, combinatorics, probability, set theory and mathematical analysis, and for personally stimulating mathematicians the world over. | ||
| 1984/85 | Kunihiko Kodaira | for his outstanding contributions to the study of complex manifolds and algebraic varieties. | |
| Hans Lewy | for initiating many, now classic and essential, developments in partial differential equations. | ||
| 1986 | Samuel Eilenberg | | for his fundamental work in algebraic topology and homological algebra. |
| Atle Selberg | for his profound and original work on number theory and on discrete groups and automorphic forms. | ||
| 1987 | Kiyoshi Itō | for his fundamental contributions to pure and applied probability theory, especially the creation of the stochastic differential and integral calculus. | |
| Peter Lax | | for his outstanding contributions to many areas of analysis and applied mathematics. | |
| 1988 | Friedrich Hirzebruch | for outstanding work combining topology, algebraic geometry and differential geometry, and algebraic number theory; and for his stimulation of mathematical cooperation and research. | |
| Lars Hörmander | for fundamental work in modern analysis, in particular, the application of pseudo-differential operators and Fourier integral operators to linear partial differential equations. | ||
| 1989 | Alberto Calderón | for his groundbreaking work on singular integral operators and their application to important problems in partial differential equations. | |
| John Milnor | for ingenious and highly original discoveries in geometry, which have opened important new vistas in topology from the algebraic, combinatorial, and differentiable viewpoint. | ||
| 1990 | Ennio De Giorgi | for his innovating ideas and fundamental achievements in partial differential equations and calculus of variations. | |
| Ilya Piatetski-Shapiro | | for his fundamental contributions in the fields of homogeneous complex domains, discrete groups, representation theory and automorphic forms. | |
| 1991 | No award | ||
| 1992 | Lennart Carleson | for his fundamental contributions to Fourier analysis, complex analysis, quasi-conformal mappings and dynamical systems. | |
| John G. Thompson | for his profound contributions to all aspects of finite group theory and connections with other branches of mathematics. | ||
| 1993 | Mikhail Gromov | | for his revolutionary contributions to global Riemannian and symplectic geometry, algebraic topology, geometric group theory and the theory of partial differential equations; |
| Jacques Tits | | for his pioneering and fundamental contributions to the theory of the structure of algebraic and other classes of groups and in particular for the theory of buildings. | |
| 1994/95 | Jürgen Moser | | for his fundamental work on stability in Hamiltonian mechanics and his profound and influential contributions to nonlinear differential equations. |
| 1995/96 | Robert Langlands | for his path-blazing work and extraordinary insight in the fields of number theory, automorphic forms and group representation. | |
| Andrew Wiles | for spectacular contributions to number theory and related fields, major advances on fundamental conjectures, and for settling Fermat's Last Theorem. | ||
| 1996/97 | Joseph B. Keller | for his profound and innovative contributions, in particular to electromagnetic, optical, and acoustic wave propagation and to fluid, solid, quantum and statistical mechanics. | |
| Yakov G. Sinai | | for his fundamental contributions to mathematically rigorous methods in statistical mechanics and the ergodic theory of dynamical systems and their applications in physics. | |
| 1998 | No award | ||
| 1999 | László Lovász | | for his outstanding contributions to combinatorics, theoretical computer science and combinatorial optimization. |
| Elias M. Stein | for his contributions to classical and Euclidean Fourier analysis and for his exceptional impact on a new generation of analysts through his eloquent teaching and writing. | ||
| 2000 | Raoul Bott | | for his deep discoveries in topology and differential geometry and their applications to Lie groups, differential operators and mathematical physics. |
| Jean-Pierre Serre | for his many fundamental contributions to topology, algebraic geometry, algebra, and number theory and for his inspirational lectures and writing. | ||
| 2001 | Vladimir Arnold | for his deep and influential work in a multitude of areas of mathematics, including dynamical systems, differential equations, and singularity theory. | |
| Saharon Shelah | for his many fundamental contributions to mathematical logic and set theory, and their applications within other parts of mathematics. | ||
| 2002/03 | Mikio Sato | for his creation of algebraic analysis, including hyperfunction theory and microfunction theory, holonomic quantum field theory, and a unified theory of soliton equations. | |
| John Tate | for his creation of fundamental concepts in algebraic number theory. | ||
| 2004 | No award | ||
| 2005 | Gregory Margulis | | for his monumental contributions to algebra, in particular to the theory of lattices in semi-simple Lie groups, and striking applications of this to ergodic theory, representation theory, number theory, combinatorics, and measure theory. |
| Sergei Novikov | for his fundamental and pioneering contributions to algebraic and differential topology, and to mathematical physics, notably the introduction of algebraic-geometric methods. | ||
| 2006/07 | Stephen Smale | for his groundbreaking contributions that have played a fundamental role in shaping differential topology, dynamical systems, mathematical economics, and other subjects in mathematics. | |
| Hillel Furstenberg | | for his profound contributions to ergodic theory, probability, topological dynamics, analysis on symmetric spaces and homogeneous flows. | |
| 2008 | Pierre Deligne | for his work on mixed Hodge theory; the Weil conjectures; the Riemann-Hilbert correspondence; and for his contributions to arithmetic. | |
| Phillip A. Griffiths | for his work on variations of Hodge structures; the theory of periods of abelian integrals; and for his contributions to complex differential geometry. | ||
| David B. Mumford | for his work on algebraic surfaces; on geometric invariant theory; and for laying the foundations of the modern algebraic theory of moduli of curves and theta functions. | ||
| 2009 | No award | ||
| 2010 | Shing-Tung Yau | for his work in geometric analysis that has had a profound and dramatic impact on many areas of geometry and physics. | |
| Dennis P. Sullivan | for his innovative contributions to algebraic topology and conformal dynamics. | ||
| 2011 | No award | ||
| 2012 | Michael Aschbacher | for his work on the theory of finite groups. | |
| Luis Caffarelli | for his work on partial differential equations. | ||
| 2013 | George D. Mostow | for his fundamental and pioneering contribution to geometry and Lie group theory. | |
| Michael Artin | for his fundamental contributions to algebraic geometry, both in commutative and noncommutative. | ||
| 2014 | Peter Sarnak | | for his deep contributions in analysis, number theory, geometry, and combinatorics. |
| 2015 | James G. Arthur | for his monumental work on the trace formula and his fundamental contributions to the theory of automorphic representations of reductive groups. | |
| 2016 | No award | ||
| 2017 | Richard Schoen | for his contributions to geometric analysis and the understanding of the interconnectedness of partial differential equations and differential geometry. | |
| Charles Fefferman | for his contributions in a number of mathematical areas including complex multivariate analysis, partial differential equations and sub-elliptical problems. | ||
| 2018 | Alexander Beilinson | | for their work that has made significant progress at the interface of geometry and mathematical physics. |
| Vladimir Drinfeld | | ||
| 2019 | Jean-Francois Le Gall | for his several deep and elegant contributions to the theory of stochastic processes. | |
| Gregory Lawler | for his comprehensive and pioneering research on erased loops and random walks.[4] | ||
| 2020 | Simon K. Donaldson | for their contributions to differential geometry and topology.[5] | |
| Yakov Eliashberg | |||
| 2021 | No award | ||
| 2022 | George Lusztig | | for his groundbreaking contributions to representation theory and related areas.[6] |
| 2023 | Ingrid Daubechies | | for her work in wavelet theory and applied harmonic analysis.[7] |
| 2024 | Adi Shamir | for his fundamental contributions to Mathematical Cryptography.[8] | |
| Noga Alon | for his fundamental contributions to Combinatorics and Theoretical Computer Science.[9] | ||
Below is a chart of all laureates per country (updated to 2024 laureates). Some laureates are counted more than once if they have multiple citizenships.
| Country | Number of laureates | |
|---|---|---|
 United States | 34 | |
| / | 10 | |
 France | 7 | |
 Israel | 5 | |
 Hungary | 5 | |
 Japan | 3 | |
 Belgium | 3 | |
 Germany | 2 | |
 United Kingdom | 2 | |
 Canada | 2 | |
 Argentina | 2 | |
 Sweden | 2 | |
 Ukraine | 2 | |
 South Africa | 1 | |
 Poland | 1 | |
 Italy | 1 | |
 China | 1 | |
 Norway | 1 | |
 Finland | 1 | |
 Romania | 1 |