The 2012 Sloan Fellowships for young US scientists, in particular mathematicians, have just been announced. The 20 laureates come from a wide variety of topics (differential geometry, PDEs, number theory, mathematical biology, theoretical computer science, …).
I was curious to see if there was anything that the laureates shared, apart from being very talented. For example, is a US PhD necessary (or even high-school in the US) or could someone coming there only at the postdoc level be eligible, and so on.
It appears that non-US PhDs are ok, but that is very rare: out of the 20 math laureates, I’ve counted just 2 with a non-US PhD. As for undergradute studies, about two thirds of them are US-educated. Finally, nationality and studies up to high-school are not an issue as expected (indeed, most were born outside the US).
Two recipients actually work in Canada, so there’s some leeway there too.
episodic thoughts 