The Filkin Medal Award is an anti, but not totally, scientific event. A team from the Mathematical Center in Akademgorodok decided to show that mathematics can be understandable, magical, and accessible not only for Candidates and Doctors of Sciences. They organized a makeshift version of the IG Nobel Prize dedicated to mathematics. The name «Filkin Medal Award» was inspired by the Fields Prize, the most prestigious mathematical award. The winner of the Filkin Medal Award is the author of a report on the most unscientific application of his own or someone else's research.
Evgeny Vdovin, Director of Mathematical Center in Akademgorodok, Professor of NSU, Mechanics and Mathematics Department talked about the Award:
«It is generally believed that modern mathematical problems are so complex that they cannot be understood by ordinary people. During the Filkin Medal Award event students, graduate students, and practicing scientists talked about deep mathematical concepts and problems and their application in real life situations in a humorous and accessible way. The event was designed to show that mathematics is not knowledge that is only accessible to the elite, but that it is a living interesting science that appears and is applied everywhere in real life.»
Twelve speakers participated in the event. They were postdocs at the Mathematical Center from Italy and Uruguay, a French postgraduate student at the Moscow Institute of Mathematics and Mathematics, NSU MMD teachers and undergraduates, and students of the NSU Research Group of Fundamental Mathematics and the NSU School of Engineering. Their presentations included ways to escape justice, walk from a nightclub to a dorm, and what programs a cat can write. Vsevolod Afanasyev, a third-year NSU MMD student, became the first Filkin Medal Award laureate with a presentation on how to optimize the spread of gossip.
Afanasyev described his winning work:
«In optimization and discrete mathematics, a big theory has been developed that includes a bunch of techniques for solving applied problems that have been known for a long time. When I was invited to speak at the Filkin Medal Award, I remembered one problem on the topic of gossip, or rather about their optimal distribution. Similar questions, not only about gossip of course, are considered in the framework of combinatorial optimization. It was fun to prepare and perform. Most of all, I appreciated the atmosphere of the Filkin Medal Award, this is exactly what is lacking in online seminars and conferences. I want more!»
