A leading physicist from the University of Aberdeen has been honoured for his innovative work in mathematical computing at an award ceremony that took place in the US.
Professor Marco Thiel, from the University’s School of Natural and Computing Sciences, picked up the Wolfram Innovator Award 2017, for his role in expanding the use of the Wolfram computer programming language.
The Wolfram language is a high-level programming language which underlies the leading computer algebra system Mathematica, which Professor Thiel uses in his teaching and research. The award is given to ‘passionate individuals and organisations who have played a major role in expanding the many areas of computing where Wolfram technologies operate.’
Together with Professor Bjoern Schelter, Professor Thiel helped organise the Maths 4 EveryDay Life Conference which was held at the University in August. The week-long conference, which was attended by school pupils, teachers, academics and students, was held to show people how to use the Wolfram Language to solve problems in their daily lives.
Commenting on his award, Professor Thiel said: “I was delighted to receive the Wolfram Innovator Award at the company’s headquarters in Illinois.
“Using the Wolfram Language we have been able to demonstrate that mathematics and computational thinking is not just for highly trained experts – we can now use ‘mathe-magical’ techniques to solve our own problems and improve our lives.
“Ultimately we are using the Wolfram Language to put the power of modern algorithms in people’s hands, and I’m delighted that our work has been recognised in this way.”