George Mostow

George Mostow
Born	(1923-07-04)July 4, 1923
Died	April 4, 2017(2017-04-04) (aged 93)
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Harvard University
Known for	Mostow's rigidity theorem Mostow–Palais theorem
Awards	Wolf Prize (2013) Leroy P. Steele Prize (1993)
Scientific career
Institutions	Syracuse University Johns Hopkins University Yale University
Thesis	The Extensibility of Local Lie Groups of Transformations and Groups on Surfaces (1948)
Doctoral advisor	Garrett Birkhoff

George Daniel Mostow (July 4, 1923 – April 4, 2017) was an American mathematician, renowned for his contributions to Lie theory. He was the Henry Ford II (emeritus) Professor of Mathematics at Yale University, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the 49th president of the American Mathematical Society (1987–1988), and a trustee of the Institute for Advanced Study from 1982 to 1992.^[1]

The rigidity phenomenon for lattices in Lie groups he discovered and explored is known as Mostow rigidity. His work on rigidity played an essential role in the work of three Fields medalists, namely Grigori Margulis, William Thurston, and Grigori Perelman. In 1993 he was awarded the American Mathematical Society's Leroy P. Steele Prize for Seminal Contribution to Research. In 2013, he was awarded the Wolf Prize in Mathematics "for his fundamental and pioneering contribution to geometry and Lie group theory."^[2]