Terence Tao

Terence Tao
AC FAA FRS
陶哲轩
Tao in 2026
Born
Terence Chi-Shen Tao

(1975-07-17) 17 July 1975
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Citizenship
  • Australia
  • United States
Education
  • Flinders University (BSc, MSc)
  • Princeton University (PhD)
Known forGreen–Tao theorem
Erdős discrepancy problem
Collatz conjecture
Maynard–Tao theorem
SpouseLaura Tao
Children2
AwardsFields Medal (2006)
List
  • Salem Prize (2000)
  • Bôcher Memorial Prize (2002)
  • Clay Research Award (2003)
  • Australian Mathematical Society Medal (2005)
  • Ostrowski Prize (2005)
  • Levi L. Conant Prize (2005)
  • MacArthur Award (2006)
  • SASTRA Ramanujan Prize (2006)
  • Sloan Fellowship (2006)
  • Fellow of the Royal Society (2007)
  • Alan T. Waterman Award (2008)
  • Onsager Medal (2008)
  • King Faisal International Prize (2010)
  • Nemmers Prize in Mathematics (2010)
  • Pólya Prize (2010)
  • Crafoord Prize (2012)
  • Simons Investigator (2012)
  • Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics (2014)
  • Royal Medal (2014)
  • PROSE Award (2015)
  • Riemann Prize (2019)
  • Princess of Asturias Award (2020)
  • Bolyai Prize (2020)
  • IEEE Jack S. Kilby Signal Processing Medal (2021)
  • Global Australian of the Year Award (2022)
  • Grande Médaille (2023)
  • Best Paper Award (2023)
  • Alexanderson Award (2023)
  • James Madison medal (2025)
  • Companion of the Order of Australia (2026)
Scientific career
FieldsHarmonic analysis
Combinatorics
Number theory
Statistics
InstitutionsUniversity of California, Los Angeles
Thesis Three Regularity Results in Harmonic Analysis  (1996)
Doctoral advisor
Elias M. Stein
Doctoral students
Monica Vișan, Tim Austin
Website
Terence Tao
Traditional Chinese
Simplified Chinese
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinTáo Zhéxuān
IPA[tʰǎʊ ʈʂɤ̌.ɕyán]
Wu
RomanizationDau2 Tseq4 Xi1 (Shanghainese)
Yue: Cantonese
Yale RomanizationTòuh Jit-hīn
JyutpingTou4 Zit3 Hin1
IPA[tʰɔw˩ tsit̚˧.hin˥]

Terence Chi-Shen Tao AC FAA FRS (Chinese: 陶哲轩; pinyin: Táo Zhéxuān; born 17 July 1975) is an Australian and American mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 2006 for his contributions to partial differential equations, combinatorics, harmonic analysis, and additive number theory. He is a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he holds the James and Carol Collins Chair in the College of Letters and Sciences. Among his contributions to mathematics is the Green–Tao theorem on prime numbers, which he proved in 2004 in collaboration with Ben Green.

Tao was born to Chinese immigrant parents and raised in Adelaide, South Australia. After studying at Princeton and joining the faculty at UCLA, he went on to be a researcher, known for the diversity of his own interests and his collaborations with others. Tao has won many prizes for his work, including the Fields Medal in 2006 and the Royal Medal and Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics in 2014. He is a 2006 MacArthur Fellow.

Tao's published research includes topics in harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, algebraic combinatorics, arithmetic combinatorics, geometric combinatorics, probability theory, compressed sensing, and analytic number theory.