Award: Chauvenet Prize

Year of Award: 1996

Publication Information: Bulletin of the AMS, (N.S.), vol. 28 (1993), 253-287

Summary: Developments in knot theory following the discovery of the Jones polynomial in 1984, including the topological meaning of the new invariants and the central role that braid theory has played, as well as the unifying principles provided by representations of simple Lie algebras and their universal enveloping algebras.

Read the Article (courtesy of the AMS) 

About the Author: Joan Birman was at Columbia University at the time of publication.