The director emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics is the first German researcher to receive this prestigious mathematics prize
Gerd Faltings is the first German mathematician to be awarded both the Abel Prize and the Fields Medal
© Peter Badge / Typos1 / The Abel Prize
- First German award winner: Gerd Faltings, director emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in Bonn, has been awarded the 2026 Abel Prize, which comes with a cash prize of approximately 670,000 euros and is considered one of the most prestigious awards in mathematics.
- Fusion of mathematical disciplines: Faltings is being honoured for his achievements in arithmetic geometry, a field that combines the study of numbers with the study of abstract geometric forms.
- Prominent centre: The Max Planck Institute for Mathematics is home to two Fields Medallists, Peter Scholze and Gerd Faltings, as well as Denis Gaitsgory, who received the 2025 Breakthrough Prize; the Abel Prize awarded to Faltings further underscores the institute's significance in the field of mathematics.
The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters has awarded the 2026 Abel Prize to Gerd Faltings, director emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in Bonn and professor emeritus at the University of Bonn, "for introducing powerful tools in arithmetic geometry and solving long-standing diophantine conjectures by Mordell and Lang." In its citation, the prize committee honours Gerd Faltings as "a towering figure in arithmetic geometry. His ideas and results have reshaped the field, settling major long-standing conjectures, while also establishing new frameworks that have guided decades of subsequent work. His exceptional achievements unite geometric and arithmetic perspectives and exemplify the power of deep structural insight."
Surprising solution to a mathematical puzzle
In 1983, Gerd Faltings became famous overnight in the mathematical community when he surprisingly proved Mordell's conjecture using entirely novel methods. The idea behind Mordell's conjecture is thousands of years old. Already the ancient Greek mathematician Diophantus of Alexandria wanted to find out how many integer solutions an equation such as a² + b² = c² has. Because of the Pythagorean theorem, this corresponds to the practical question of how many right-angled triangles with integer side lengths there are. It is now clear: There are infinitely many of them. In 1637, Pierre de Fermat proposed the now-proven conjecture that this is an exception for squares and that an+ bn= cn for n > 2 has no integer solutions at all. But why?
At the beginning of the 20th century, it gradually became clear that the question of whether and how many integer solutions such polynomial equations have depends on a geometric property: If one solves them not for integers but for complex numbers, the set of solutions is often a smooth closed surface, such as the surface of a sphere, a torus, or a pretzel. Such surfaces can be classified by the number of their "holes," which in mathematics is called the genus of the surface. For example, a spherical surface has genus 0, a doughnut with one hole has genus 1, a pretzel has genus 3, and so on.
The number of integer or rational solutions now depends crucially on the genus of these surfaces. Rational numbers can be expressed as fractions of two integers. In 1922, Louis Mordell conjectured that equations with fields of genus greater than 1 can have at most a finite number of rational solutions. For over 60 years, this conjecture stubbornly resisted all attempts at proof. It had come to be regarded as unsolvable when Gerd Faltings, at the age of 28, surprised the scientific community with his proof. Since then, Mordell's conjecture has been known as Faltings' theorem.
The equation an + bn = cn is of genus > 1 for n > 3. It therefore follows from Faltings' Theorem that there can be at most a finite number of rational and thus also integer solutions. The theorem is one of the decisive steps in the proof of Fermat's Last Theorem. However, Faltings' result is much more general and has numerous other applications. With many other results of comparable significance, Gerd Faltings became one of the leading figures in arithmetic geometry.
A major centre for mathematics
The prize will be presented by His Royal Highness Crown Prince Haakon at a ceremony on May 26, 2026, in Oslo. It consists of 7.5 million Norwegian kroner, equivalent to €670,000, and is funded by the Norwegian government. Gerd Faltings is the first German mathematician to receive this high honour in mathematics.
In 1986, Faltings became the first German to receive the Fields Medal, considered the highest honour in mathematics. In 2018, Peter Scholze, also a director at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics, became the second German to be awarded the Fields Medal. The institute's significance in mathematical research is further underscored by the 2025 Breakthrough Prize awarded to Dennis Gaitsgory, who has been director there since 2021, and now the Abel Prize awarded to Gerd Faltings.
Gerd Faltings was born in Gelsenkirchen in 1954, the son of a physicist and a chemist. During his school years, he was twice a winner in the National Mathematics Competition for students. After graduating from high school, he studied mathematics and physics at the University of Münster. In 1978, he completed his studies with a doctorate under Hans-Joachim Nastold. In 1978-79, he was a visiting scholar at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Upon his return to Münster, he became an assistant to Professor Nastold in 1979 and earned his habilitation in 1981. In 1982, he was appointed to the University of Wuppertal and, at the age of 27, became the youngest full professor of mathematics in Germany. In 1985, he accepted a position at Princeton University in the United States. As his daughters grew older, he returned to Germany in 1994, where he has since been conducting research at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in Bonn and teaching at the University of Bonn. Since 2023, he has been Director Emeritus at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in Bonn. Gerd Faltings has two daughters, is a connoisseur of opera and classical music, loves good wine, enjoys working in his garden, and is a fan of the soccer club FC Schalke 04.
