Alison Beth Miller is an American mathematician who was the first American female gold medalist at the

International Mathematical Olympiad The International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) is a mathematical olympiad for pre-university students, and is the oldest of the International Science Olympiads. It is widely regarded as the most prestigious mathematical competition in the wor ...

. She also holds the distinction of placing in the top 16 of the

Putnam Competition The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, often abbreviated to Putnam Competition, is an annual mathematics competition for undergraduate college students enrolled at institutions of higher learning in the United States and Canada (regar ...

four times, the last three of which were recognized by the Elizabeth Lowell Putnam award for outstanding performance by a woman on the contest.

Early life, education and career

Miller was home-schooled in

Niskayuna, New York Niskayuna is a town in Schenectady County, New York, United States. The population was 23,278 at the 2020 census. The town is located in the southeast part of the county, east of the city of Schenectady, and is the easternmost town in the county. ...

, and in 2000 came in third place in the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee. She competed for the U.S. in the

in 2004, where she became the first American female gold medalist.. Includes an extended description of Miller's home education and early interest in mathematics. As an undergraduate, she studied mathematics at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. She won the Elizabeth Lowell Putnam award for outstanding performance by a woman in the

in 2005, 2006, and 2007,. matching the record set ten years earlier by Ioana Dumitriu. She coached American girls participating in the China Girls Mathematical Olympiad in 2007, the first year that the U.S. was represented in that Olympiad. In 2008, she became a co-winner of the Alice T. Schafer Prize for excellence in mathematics by an undergraduate woman from the

Association for Women in Mathematics The Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) is a professional society whose mission is to encourage women and girls to study and to have active careers in the mathematical sciences, and to promote equal opportunity for and the equal treatment o ...

for her three undergraduate research papers. That year she also received her B.A. degree with Highest Honors in Mathematics from Harvard University.. Her senior thesis, for which she won the Hoopes Prize, was titled "Explicit Class Field Theory in Function Fields: Gross-Stark Units and Drinfeld Modules." She was then awarded a

Churchill Scholarship The Churchill Scholarship is awarded by the Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States to graduates of the more than one hundred colleges and universities invited to participate in the Churchill Scholarship Program, for the pursuit of res ...

to study for a year at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

in England. She earned her Ph.D. from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

in 2014, under the supervision of

Manjul Bhargava Manjul Bhargava (born 8 August 1974) is a Canadian-American mathematician. He is the Brandon Fradd, Class of 1983, Professor of Mathematics at Princeton University, the Stieltjes Professor of Number Theory at Leiden University, and also holds A ...

; her dissertation concerned

knot invariant In the mathematical field of knot theory, a knot invariant is a quantity (in a broad sense) defined for each knot which is the same for equivalent knots. The equivalence is often given by ambient isotopy but can be given by homeomorphism. Some i ...

s. After graduation, she was a postdoctoral researcher at

before becoming an associate editor for

Mathematical Reviews ''Mathematical Reviews'' is a journal published by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) that contains brief synopses, and in some cases evaluations, of many articles in mathematics, statistics, and theoretical computer science. The AMS also pu ...

. She should not be confused with Allison N. Miller, a mathematician at

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the e ...

References

External links

Home page
hosted by the University of Michigan {{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, Alison Harvard University alumni Living people 21st-century American mathematicians International Mathematical Olympiad participants Princeton University alumni Scripps National Spelling Bee participants 21st-century American women mathematicians Year of birth missing (living people)