評(píng)論
打印
In the 70s Fermat was no longer in fashion.
70年代時(shí)，費(fèi)馬不再熱門
At the same time Andrew Wiles was just beginning his career as a mathematician.
與此同時(shí)，安德魯·懷爾斯正開始其作為數(shù)學(xué)家的生涯。
He went to Cambridge as a research student under the supervision of Professor John Coates.
他作為一名研究生進(jìn)入劍橋大學(xué)，師從約翰·科茨教授。
I've been very fortunate to have Andrew as a student,
我很幸運(yùn)有安德魯作學(xué)生
and even as a research student he, he was a wonderful person to work with.
即使那時(shí)他僅是個(gè)研究生，也是位共事的好伙伴了。
He had very deep ideas then, and it was always clear he was a mathematician who would do great things.
他那時(shí)就有深邃的思想，顯而易見，他是個(gè)可做大事情的數(shù)學(xué)家。
But not with Fermat. Everyone thought Fermat's last theorem was impossible,
但不是做費(fèi)馬的文章。每個(gè)人都認(rèn)為費(fèi)馬最后定理是不可證的，
so Professor Coates encouraged Andrew to forget his childhood dream and work on more mainstream maths.
因此科茨教授力勸安德魯忘記他兒時(shí)的夢(mèng)想，而研究更為主流的數(shù)學(xué)課題。
When I went to Cambridge my advisor, John Coates,
我去劍橋時(shí)，我的導(dǎo)師約翰·科茨，
was working on Iwasawa theory and elliptic curves and I started working with him.
正在研究伊娃沙娃理論以及橢圓曲線，我開始與他共事。
Elliptic curves were the in thing to study, but perversely, elliptic curves are neither ellipses nor curves.
橢圓曲線是熱門研究對(duì)象，但橢圓曲線既非橢圓也非曲線。
You may never have heard of elliptic curves, but they're extremely important.
你可能從未聽說過橢圓曲線，但它們都極為重要。
OK, so what's an elliptic curve?
那么，一條橢圓曲線是什么呢？
Elliptic curves -- they're not ellipses, they're cubic curves whose solution have a shape that looks like a doughnut.
橢圓曲線，不是橢圓，它們是三次曲線，其解的形狀看來像是個(gè)甜甜圈。
