The 2005 European Prize in Combinatorics was awarded to Dmitry Feichtner-Kozlov, a mathematician whose academic career spans Russia, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany, and Japan. He focuses on the intersection of algebraic topology and combinatorial structures, publishing much of his scholarly output under the name Dmitry N. Kozlov to investigate properties of spaces and polyhedral complexes.
Academic Background and Early Research
Born in Tomsk, Russia, in 1972, Feichtner-Kozlov pursued his higher education at the Royal Institute of Technology and Lund University. He earned his Ph.D. from the Royal Institute of Technology in 1996. His doctoral thesis, supervised by Anders Björner, was titled Extremal Combinatorics, Weighting Algorithms, and Topology of Subspaces Arrangements. Following his studies, he held positions at various international institutions, including the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley.
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In 2004, Feichtner-Kozlov joined ETH Zurich as an assistant professor. His career continued at the University of Bremen in 2007, where he serves as the director of the Institute for Algebra, Geometry, Topology and their applications and holds the Chair of Algebra and Geometry. Additionally, his professional history includes teaching and research appointments at the University of Newcastle from 2009 to 2019, as well as a tenure at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology in 2019.
Contributions to Combinatorial Topology
Feichtner-Kozlov focuses on topological methods applied to combinatorics, specifically examining graph colorings, cell complexes, and the stratification of spaces. In 2014, he co-authored Distributed Computing through Combinatorial Topology with Maurice Herlihy and Sergio Rajsbaum, a text later recognized as a Notable Book by the Association for Computing Machinery. He also serves as a managing editor for the Journal of Applied and Computational Topology and is a frequent collaborator with Eva-Maria Feichtner.
Fast facts
- Born: 1972, Tomsk, Russia
- Field: Algebraic Topology
- Education: Royal Institute of Technology; Lund University
- Award: European Prize in Combinatorics (2005)
- Award: Wallenberg Prize (2003)
- Award: Goran Gustafsson Prize (2004)
- Languages: English, Russian
Questions readers ask
What is the primary focus of his research?
He specializes in algebraic topology and combinatorial geometry, often applying topological methods to problems in graph theory and distributed computing.
Where is he currently based?
He holds the Chair of Algebra and Geometry at the University of Bremen in Germany.
Achievements
- European Prize in Combinatorics — 2005
- Held posts at University of Bremen, ETH Zurich and Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology
- Fields: algebraic topology
