mathematics

Igor Rivin

Igor Rivin is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Igor Rivin rather than just read about it. In short: Igor Rivin (born 1961 in Moscow, USSR) is a Russian-Canadian mathematician, working in various fields of pure and applied mathematics, computer science, and materials science. He was the Regius Professor of Mathematics at the University of St.

Key takeaways

Igor Rivin belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Igor Rivin to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Igor Rivin from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Igor Rivin (born 1961 in Moscow, USSR) is a Russian-Canadian mathematician, working in various fields of pure and applied mathematics, computer science, and materials science. He was the Regius Professor of Mathematics at the University of St. Andrews from 2015 to 2017, and was the chief research officer at Cryptos Fund until 2019. He was the principal of a couple of small hedge funds, and later did research for Edgestream LP, in addition to his academic work.

Career He received his B.Sc. (Hon) in mathematics from the University of Toronto in 1981, and his Ph.D. in 1986 from Princeton University under the direction of William Thurston. Following his doctorate, Rivin directed development of QLISP and the Mathematica kernel, before returning to academia in 1992, where he held positions at the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques, the Institute for Advanced Study, the University of Melbourne, Warwick, and Caltech. Since 1999, Rivin has been professor of mathematics at Temple University. Between 2015 and 2017 he was Regius Professor of Mathematics at the University of St. Andrews.

Major accomplishments Rivin's PhD thesis and a series of extensions characterized hyperbolic 3-dimensional polyhedra in terms of their dihedral angles, resolving a long-standing open question of Jakob Steiner on the inscribable combinatorial types. These, and some related results in convex geometry, have been used in 3-manifold topology, theoretical physics, computational geometry, and the recently developed field of discrete differential geometry. Rivin has also made advances in counting geodesics on surfaces, the study of generic elements of discrete subgroups of Lie groups, and in the theory of dynamical systems. Rivin is also active in applied areas, having written large parts of the Mathematica 2.0 kernel, and he developed a database of hypothetical zeolites in collaboration with M. M. J. Treacy. Rivin is a frequent contributor to MathOverflow. Igor Rivin is the co-creator, with economist Carlo Scevola, of Cryptocurrencies Index 30 (CCi30), an index of the top 30 cryptocurrencies weighted by market capitalization. CCi30 is sometimes used by academic economists as a market index when comparing the cryptocurrency trading market as a whole with individual currencies.

Honors First prize, Canadian Mathematical Olympiad, 1977 Whitehead prize of the London Mathematical Society, 1998 Advanced Research Fellowship of the EPSRC, 1998 Lady Davis Fellowship at the Hebrew University, 2006 Berlin Mathematical School professorship, 2011. Fellow of the American Mathematical Society, 2014.

References

External links Igor Rivin's author profile at MathSciNet Igor Rivin's Google Scholar profile Archived 2016-10-25 at the Wayback Machine Igor Rivin at Math Overflow Igor Rivin at the Mathematics Genealogy Project Cryptocurrencies Index 30

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Igor Rivin

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Igor Rivin claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Igor Rivin before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Igor Rivin ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Igor Rivin

In research: Igor Rivin appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Igor Rivin in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Igor Rivin is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1961 births, 20th-century American mathematicians, 21st-century American Jews, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Igor Rivin outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “Igor Rivin” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Igor Rivin in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Igor Rivin means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Igor Rivin out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Igor Rivin in simple terms?

Why does Igor Rivin matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Igor Rivin?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Igor Rivin.