I seldom (but sometimes) talk about Science or Mathematics. Mostly when it helps me illustrate what innovation or creativity is about, and sometimes when I see analog crises in all these fields (see for example the posts on Dyson, Thiel or Smolin). And there is another related point: it is often claimed that major scientific discoveries or entrepreneurial ventures are done at a young age.

Yitang Zhang

You probably never heard of Yitang Zhang who has stunned the world of mathematics last month by proving a centuries-old problem. He is a totally unknown mathematician and more surprising, he is (over) 50-year old. For those interested in the problem, you can read Nature’s First proof that infinitely many prime numbers come in pairs. Basically, Zhang proved that there are infinitely many pairs of primes that are less than N apart. Mathematicians still dream to prove that N is equal to 2 – the twin prime conjecture -, but Zhang was first to prove that N exists … even if N is 70 million!