First woman to win maths' Fields Medal, dies

Maryam Mirzakhani, the first woman to receive the prestigious Fields Medal for mathematics, has died in the US.

Nicknamed the "Nobel Prize for Mathematics", the Fields Medal is only awarded every four years to between two and four mathematicians under 40.

Born in 1977, Prof Mirzakhani was brought up in post-revolutionary Iran and won two gold medals in the International Mathematical Olympiad as a teenager.

Her receipt of the Fields Medal three years ago ended a long wait for women in the mathematics community for the prize, first established in 1936.

Prof Dame Frances Kirwan, a member of the medal selection committee from the University of Oxford, said at the time: "I hope that this award will inspire lots more girls and young women, in this country and around the world, to believe in their own abilities and aim to be the Fields Medallists of the future."

The 40-year-old had breast cancer, which had spread to her bones.

UCJ, UNILORIN.