William A. Stein (b. 1974) — Biography & Facts

William A. Stein developed the SageMath software package and founded CoCalc, facilitating computational research in arithmetic and number theory. Born in Santa Barbara in 1974, he combines academic practice with engineering to address complex mathematical problems, including studies on modular forms and the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture.

Academic Background and Research

Stein pursued his higher education at Northern Arizona University and the University of California, Berkeley. He completed his doctoral studies in 2000, presenting a dissertation titled Explicit Approaches to Modular Abelian Varieties under the supervision of Hendrik W. Lenstra. His research focuses on theoretical and computational aspects of modular forms.

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Professional Contributions

Serving as a professor of mathematics at the University of Washington, Stein focused on the intersection of software development and number theory. He gained recognition for his work on the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture. In 2013, he received the Richard Dimick Jenks Memorial Prize Award for his contributions to the field.

Publications and Texts

Stein has documented his work through various academic publications. In 2009, Springer Verlag published his book titled Elementary Number Theory: Primes, Congruences, and Secrets. He also collaborated with Barry Mazur on the 2016 work Prime Numbers and the Riemann Hypothesis, published by Cambridge University Press.