Marcus Peter Francis du Sautoy (; born 26 August 1965) is a British mathematician,

Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science The Simonyi Professorship for the Public Understanding of Science is a chair at the University of Oxford. The chair was established in 1995 for the ethologist Richard Dawkins by an endowment from Charles Simonyi. The aim of the Professorship is ...

at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

New College, Oxford New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as its feeder school, New College is one of the oldest colleges at ...

and author of

popular mathematics Popular mathematics is the presentation of mathematics to an aimed general audience. The difference between recreational mathematics and popular mathematics is that recreational mathematics intends to be fun for the mathematical community, and ...

and

popular science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...

books. He was previously a fellow of

All Souls College, Oxford All Souls College (official name: College of the Souls of All the Faithful Departed) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Unique to All Souls, all of its members automatically become fellows (i.e., full members of ...

Wadham College, Oxford Wadham College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It is located in the centre of Oxford, at the intersection of Broad Street and Parks Road. Wadham College was founded in 1610 by Dorothy ...

and served as president of the

Mathematical Association The Mathematical Association is a professional society concerned with mathematics education in the UK. History It was founded in 1871 as the Association for the Improvement of Geometrical Teaching and renamed to the Mathematical Association in ...

, an

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is a British Research Council that provides government funding for grants to undertake research and postgraduate degrees in engineering and the physical sciences, mainly to univers ...

(EPSRC) senior media fellow, and a

Royal Society University Research Fellow __NOTOC__ The Royal Society University Research Fellowship (URF) is a research fellowship awarded to outstanding early career scientists in the United Kingdom who are judged by the Royal Society to have the potential to become leaders in their ...

.Marcus du Sautoy In 1996, he was awarded the

title of distinction The University of Oxford introduced Titles of Distinction for senior academics in the 1990s. These are not established chairs, which are posts funded by endowment for academics with a distinguished career in British and European universities. Howev ...

of Professor of Mathematics.

Education and early life

Du Sautoy was born in London to Bernard du Sautoy, employed in the computer industry, and Jennifer du Sautoy, who left the

Foreign Office Foreign may refer to: Government * Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries * Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries ** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government ** Foreign office and foreign minister * Unit ...

to raise her children. He grew up in

Henley-on-Thames Henley-on-Thames ( ) is a town and civil parish on the River Thames in Oxfordshire, England, northeast of Reading, west of Maidenhead, southeast of Oxford and west of London (by road), near the tripoint of Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckin ...

. His grandfather, Peter du Sautoy, was chairman of the publisher

Faber and Faber Faber and Faber Limited, usually abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in London. Published authors and poets include T. S. Eliot (an early Faber editor and director), W. H. Auden, Margaret Storey, William Golding, Samuel ...

, and managed the estates of

James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the Modernism, modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important ...

and

Samuel Beckett Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish novelist, dramatist, short story writer, theatre director, poet, and literary translator. His literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal and Tragicomedy, tr ...

. Du Sautoy was educated at Gillotts Comprehensive School and King James's Sixth Form College (now Henley College) and

, where he was awarded a

first class honours The British undergraduate degree classification system is a grading structure for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and integrated master's degrees in the United Kingdom. The system has been applied (sometimes with significant variati ...

degree in

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

. In 1991 he completed a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...

in mathematics on

discrete group In mathematics, a topological group ''G'' is called a discrete group if there is no limit point in it (i.e., for each element in ''G'', there is a neighborhood which only contains that element). Equivalently, the group ''G'' is discrete if and o ...

s, analytic groups and Poincaré series, supervised by Dan Segal.

Career and research

Du Sautoy's research "uses classical tools from number theory to explore the mathematics of symmetry". Du Sautoy's academic work concerns mainly

group theory In abstract algebra, group theory studies the algebraic structures known as groups. The concept of a group is central to abstract algebra: other well-known algebraic structures, such as rings, fields, and vector spaces, can all be seen ...

and

number theory Number theory (or arithmetic or higher arithmetic in older usage) is a branch of pure mathematics devoted primarily to the study of the integers and integer-valued functions. German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855) said, "Ma ...

. Du Sautoy is known for his work popularising mathematics, and has been named by ''

The Independent on Sunday ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was published ...

'' as one of the UK's leading scientists. He has also served on the advisory board of Mangahigh.com an online maths game website. Du Sautoy is a regular contributor to the BBC Radio 4's ''

In Our Time In Our Time may refer to: * ''In Our Time'' (1944 film), a film starring Ida Lupino and Paul Henreid * ''In Our Time'' (1982 film), a Taiwanese anthology film featuring director Edward Yang; considered the beginning of the "New Taiwan Cinema" * ''In ...

'' programme and has written for ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ( ...

'' and ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

''. Du Sautoy has also written numerous academic articles and books on mathematics, the most recent being an exploration of the current state of creativity in artificial intelligence, ''The Creativity Code''. In a 2006 article published in ''

Seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiosper ...

'' magazine, du Sautoy discussed the Hilbert-Pólya conjecture, a way for advances in quantum physics to provide insight into the

Riemann hypothesis In mathematics, the Riemann hypothesis is the conjecture that the Riemann zeta function has its zeros only at the negative even integers and complex numbers with real part . Many consider it to be the most important unsolved problem in p ...

Books

His

and

books include: * ''

The Music of the Primes ''The Music of the Primes'' (British subtitle: ''Why an Unsolved Problem in Mathematics Matters''; American subtitle: ''Searching to Solve the Greatest Mystery in Mathematics'') is a 2003 book by Marcus du Sautoy, a professor in mathematics at th ...

'' * ''Finding Moonshine'' * ''Symmetry: A Journey into the Patterns of Nature'' * ''The Num8er My5teries: A Mathematical Odyssey Through Everyday Life'' * '' What We Cannot Know'' * ''The Great Unknown: Seven Journeys to the Frontiers of Science'' * ''The Creativity Code: How AI Is Learning to Write, Paint and Think'' * ''Thinking Better: The Art of the Shortcut''

Television

Among many other programmes, Du Sautoy presented the

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

television programme ''Mind Games'' and co-hosted the TV series ''

School of Hard Sums A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compuls ...

'' with

Dara Ó Briain Dara Ó Briain ( , ; born 4 February 1972) is an Irish comedian and television presenter based in the United Kingdom. He is noted for performing stand-up comedy shows all over the world and for hosting topical panel shows such as ''Mock the W ...

. On the latter show, he posed mathematical questions with real-world applications. Ó Briain and a guest then tried to solve the problems, using rigorous and experimental methods, respectively. In December 2006, du Sautoy delivered the 2006

Royal Institution Christmas Lectures The Royal Institution Christmas Lectures are a series of lectures on a single topic each, which have been held at the Royal Institution in London each year since 1825, missing 1939–1942 because of the Second World War. The lectures present sc ...

under the collective title ''The Num8er My5teries''. This was only the third time the subject of the lectures had been mathematics – on the first occasion, in 1978, when the lecture was delivered by Erik Christopher Zeeman, du Sautoy had been a schoolboy in the audience. Other television work includes: * ''Mindgames'' (BBC Four, 2004–5). Presented 20 episodes of puzzle gameshow with regular guests Kathy Sykes and

Michael Rosen Michael Wayne Rosen (born 7 May 1946) is a British children's author, poet, presenter, political columnist, broadcaster and activist who has written 140 books. He served as Children's Laureate from 2007 to 2009. Early life Michael Wayne Ro ...

. * ''The Music of the Primes'' (BBC Four, 2005, BBC 2 2007). One-hour documentary based on his book. * ''Painting with Numbers'' (Teachers TV 2006). Four fifteen-minute programmes covering numerous topics from risk and probability to concepts of infinity, from codes and cryptography to flowers and football. * ''The Num8er My5teries:

Royal Institution The Royal Institution of Great Britain (often the Royal Institution, Ri or RI) is an organisation for scientific education and research, based in the City of Westminster. It was founded in 1799 by the leading British scientists of the age, inc ...

Christmas Lectures'' (Channel 5, 2006), five lectures about the great unsolved problems of mathematics. * ''

The Story of Maths ''The Story of Maths'' is a four-part British television series outlining aspects of the history of mathematics. It was a co-production between the Open University and the BBC and aired in October 2008 on BBC Four. The material was written and pre ...

'' (BBC Four, 2008) is a four-part series first broadcast on

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

. In this series he discovers techniques and theories from different times and cultures. * ''

Horizon The horizon is the apparent line that separates the surface of a celestial body from its sky when viewed from the perspective of an observer on or near the surface of the relevant body. This line divides all viewing directions based on whether i ...

: Alan and Marcus Go Forth and Multiply'' (

BBC 2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream ...

, 2009).

Alan Davies Alan Roger Davies (; born 6 March 1966) is an English stand-up comedian, writer, actor and TV presenter. He is best known for his portrayal of the title role in the BBC mystery drama series ''Jonathan Creek'' (1997–2016) and as the only per ...

embarks on a maths odyssey with the help of mathematician Marcus du Sautoy. * ''Horizon: The Secret You'' (BBC 2, 2009). Marcus du Sautoy investigates self-awareness. * ''Horizon: How Long is a Piece of String?'' (BBC 2, 2009). Alan Davies attempts to answer the proverbial question: How long is a piece of string? Featuring Marcus du Sautoy. * ''Horizon: What Makes a Genius?'' (BBC 2, 2010). Marcus du Sautoy asks if geniuses' brains are fundamentally different from his. * ''The Beauty of Diagrams'' (BBC Four, 2010). Produced by Michael Waterhouse and directed by Steven Clarke, Marcus du Sautoy discusses influential scientific diagrams, starting with Vitruvian Man,

Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially rested on ...

's iconic anatomical drawing which follows the geometrical ideas of the Roman architect

Vitruvius Vitruvius (; c. 80–70 BC – after c. 15 BC) was a Roman architect and engineer during the 1st century BC, known for his multi-volume work entitled '' De architectura''. He originated the idea that all buildings should have three attribut ...

. * '' The Code'' (BBC 2, 2011). A three-part documentary series which began broadcasting on 27 July 2011. * ''Faster Than the Speed of Light?'' (BBC 2, 2011). Marcus du Sautoy discusses a recent discovery, the

faster-than-light neutrino anomaly In 2011, the OPERA experiment mistakenly observed neutrinos appearing to travel faster-than-light, faster than light. Even before the source of the error was discovered, the result was considered anomalous because speeds higher than that of lig ...

, that neutrinos may travel faster than light. First broadcast on 19 October 2011. * ''

: The Hunt for AI'' (

, 2012). Marcus Du Sautoy asks how close mankind is to creating computers or robots that can think for themselves – artificial intelligence, AI. First broadcast on 3 April 2012. * '' Dara Ó Briain's School of Hard Sums'' (

Dave Dave may refer to: Film, television, and theater * ''Dave'' (film), a 1993 film starring Kevin Kline and Sigourney Weaver * ''Dave'' (musical), a 2018 stage musical adaptation of the film * Dave (TV channel), a digital television channel in the ...

, 2012). Co-host with

. Dara and guests attempt to solve problems posed by Marcus Du Sautoy with mathematics or through trial and error. First broadcast on 16 April 2012. * '' Precision: The Measure of All Things'' (

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

, 2013). Professor Marcus du Sautoy explores why we are driven to measure and quantify the world around us and why we have reduced the universe to just a handful of fundamental units of measurement. First broadcast on 10 June 2013. * ''The Secret Rules of Modern Living: Algorithms'' (

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

, 2015). Mathematician Professor Marcus du Sautoy demystifies the hidden world of algorithms. First broadcast on 24 September 2015.

Awards and honours

Du Sautoy was awarded the

Berwick Prize The Berwick Prize and Senior Berwick Prize are two prizes of the London Mathematical Society awarded in alternating years in memory of William Edward Hodgson Berwick, a previous Vice-President of the LMS. Berwick left some money to be given to the ...

in 2001 by the

London Mathematical Society The London Mathematical Society (LMS) is one of the United Kingdom's learned societies for mathematics (the others being the Royal Statistical Society (RSS), the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (IMA), the Edinburgh Mathematical ...

for the publication of outstanding mathematical research. In 2009 he won the

Michael Faraday Prize The Royal Society of London Michael Faraday Prize is awarded for "excellence in communicating science to UK audiences". Named after Michael Faraday, the medal itself is made of silver gilt, and is accompanied by a purse of £2500. Background ...

from the

Royal Society of London The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, r ...

for "excellence in communicating science to UK audiences". Du Sautoy was appointed

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established ...

(OBE) in the

2010 New Year Honours The New Year Honours 2010 were announced on 31 December 2009 in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Cook Islands, Barbados, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Saint Lucia, Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, Saint Christopher and NevisSaint Christ ...

"for services to Science". He was elected a fellow of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meeting ...

in 2012 and in a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathemati ...

(FRS) in 2016.

Personal life

Du Sautoy lives in London with his family and plays

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

(No 17 for Recreativo Hackney FC) and the trumpet. He met his wife Shani while a

postdoctoral researcher A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to pu ...

at the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...

. They have three children, who are being raised

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. Du Sautoy is an

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

but has stated that as holder of the Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science his focus is going to be "very much on the science and less on religion", perhaps suggesting a difference of emphasis compared with his predecessor in the post,

Richard Dawkins Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An ...

. He has described his own religion as being " Arsenal – football", as he sees religion as wanting to belong to a community. Du Sautoy is a supporter of

Common Hope {{unreferenced, date=January 2014 Common Hope is a non-profit organization based out of St. Paul, Minnesota that works with people in Guatemala. Common Hope provides support for over 2,700 children to attend school each year in seventeen villages o ...

, an organisation that helps people in

Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by Hon ...

. He is the grandson of Peter du Sautoy and his godmother was Valerie Eliot.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Du Sautoy, Marcus 1965 births Living people People from Henley-on-Thames Alumni of Wadham College, Oxford 20th-century British mathematicians 21st-century British mathematicians English atheists Fellows of All Souls College, Oxford Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Fellows of New College, Oxford Fellows of Wadham College, Oxford Group theorists Number theorists Officers of the Order of the British Empire Simonyi Professors for the Public Understanding of Science Fellows of the Royal Society Mathematics popularizers