Harvard, MIT Math Professors Agree That Theorem is Valid

The recent findings of a German mathematical disrupted the tranquil summers of his peers at Harvard and MIT who pushed aside their own research and met informally to verity whether he had solved a problem that had been mathematicians for more than 60 years.

In early June. scholars around the world began to gain access to 29 years-old Gerd Faltings proof confirming the Mordell conjecture--originally published in 1929 paper--which suggested that the majority of polynomial equations have only a finite number of rational solutions.

Harvard Perkins Professor of Mathematics John T. Tate said recently that although a number of mathematicians--including, himself--have solved specific cases of the conjecture. Faltings' work is far more broad, applying to all polynomial equations.

"It changes the whole picture in number theory." Tate said. "We now know a lot more. The frontier has been pushed back." Faltings' breakthrough, he speculated, might help other researchers solve other problems related to the conjecture.

According to Tate and other math professors, the findings of Faltings--who they said visited Harvard in 1978 in an informal capacity and without any publicity--have prompted researchers to drop their own work and try to verify the new theory. Several mathematicians at Harvard and MIT met during late June and July to share their expertise and verity different parts of Faltings manuscript.

Michael Artin, a mathematical professor at MIT said the informal group formed "spontaneously" and met two or three times a week--often for two hours at a time.

Faltings' manuscript is only 40 pages, which according to Artin, is unusually concise for a through mathematical proof. As a result the mathematicians had to go back to Faltings' original sources to double check the professor's work. But after the meetings, all the mathematicians agreed that Faltings' work is "strikingly foolproof." David Kazhdan, Professor of Mathematics said last week.

Artin said Faltings' findings pushed his own work back a month because he "put everything aside to read this manuscript."

"Only someone with several 200-level math courses under his belt is able to understand the material. Tate said, adding that the work may eventually be simplified.

Tate said he remembered Faltings as "very bright, brash and full of energy and so on", but he added that he was surprised to discover that Faltings had been the one to solve the Mordell conjecture, a problem he himself had worked on for several years.