TEHRAN - July 14, 2017, was an especially sad day for Iranians around the world. On that day, Iranian-American genius mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani died of cancer when she was only 40.

In 2014, she won the prestigious Fields Medal award for “her outstanding contribution” to building knowledge and understanding of the dynamics and the geometry of curved surfaces. She was the first woman and the first Iranian to win the prize, which is often considered the “Nobel Prize” in mathematics.

In 2016, she was elected to the American National Academy of Sciences, which recognizes outstanding accomplishments in original research. This honor had previously gone to famous scientists such as Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, and Thomas Edison.

Mirzakhani was born in Tehran in May 1977. “As a kid, I dreamt of becoming a writer,” she told the Guardian newspaper after she was awarded the Fields medal. “My most exciting pastime was reading novels; in fact, I would read anything I could find. I never thought I would pursue mathematics until my last year in high school. I grew up in a family with three siblings. My parents were always very supportive and encouraging. It was important for them that we have meaningful and satisfying professions, but they didn't care as much about success and achievement.”

In 1994 and 1995 she was awarded gold medals by Iran’s Mathematical Olympiad. She received her bachelor’s degree in science from Tehran’s Sharif University of Technology in 1999 and was given a scholarship from Harvard University, where she completed a PhD in 2004.

She became a professor of mathematics at Stanford University in 2008, at the age of 31.

In 2006, Popular Science magazine named Mirzakhani on its annual Brilliant 10 list. In 2009 she won the American Mathematical Society’s Blumenthal Award for the Advancement of Research in Pure Mathematics. Her other awards include the 2013 Satter Prize in Mathematics and the 2014 Clay Research Award.

“Mirzakhani is the right woman at the right time,” said an article published in the UK’s Times Higher Education after she had been presented with the prestigious award, Iran Wire reported.

“Born with an exceptional gift for mathematics, her talents have been nurtured and allowed to flourish, her teachers have recognized and fostered her genius, and her male colleagues have not questioned her ability in a subject where raw brain power is what brings the most respect,” it said.

Mirzakhani’s achievements “combine superb problem-solving ability, ambitious mathematical vision, and fluency in many disciplines, which is unusual in the modern era, when considerable specialization is often required to reach the frontier,” said Curtis McMullen of Harvard University.

At the urging of the Iranian Mathematical Society’s Women's Committee, the International Council for Science declared Mirzakhani's birthday, May 12, as the International Women in Mathematics Day in respect of her memory.

In 2022, the University of Oxford launched the Maryam Mirzakhani Scholarships, which provide support for female mathematicians pursuing doctoral studies at the university.