The King has approved the appointment of James Maynard as the new Regius Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford. He will take up the post in the Mathematical Institute on 1 October 2026, and will also be a professorial fellow of Merton College.
This chair is one of three Regius Professorships of Mathematics in the United Kingdom, the others being at St Andrews and Warwick. The Oxford Regius chair was created in 2016 as part of the 90th birthday celebrations for Queen Elizabeth II. James will succeed the inaugural postholder, Andrew Wiles.
James says of his appointment: "I’m delighted to be appointed as the new Regius Professor of Mathematics. Oxford is a fantastic place to do maths, and I feel exceptionally privileged to have spent most of my career here. It sometimes feels like there are exciting ideas bubbling away and breakthroughs happening in every office of the department. Mathematics is a very special subject where pure abstract thought and logic, often driven by mere curiosity, can lead to breakthroughs improving so many aspects of modern life. I’m rather daunted to follow on from the incredible legacy of Andrew Wiles, but I hope this position can be testament to the ongoing importance and increasing role of mathematics in the world."
Jon Chapman, Head of the Mathematical Institute, said: "We are delighted that James has accepted the Regius Professor of Mathematics. His work has led to some of the most significant advances in number theory of recent decades, and he is widely admired not only for the depth and originality of his research but also for his generosity as a colleague and mentor. As a former Oxford graduate student who has built his academic career here, James exemplifies the extraordinary mathematical talent that our community fosters. I can think of no better person to succeed Andrew Wiles in this prestigious role."
Jennifer Payne, Warden of Merton College, added: “The College offers Professor James Maynard our warmest congratulations on his appointment as the new Regius Professor of Mathematics. It is a fitting recognition of his outstanding contribution to mathematics. We look forward to welcoming him into the College.”
About James Maynard
Professor Maynard is Professor of Number Theory at the Mathematical Institute in Oxford. He took his BA and 'Part III' in Mathematics from Queens' College, Cambridge, followed by a DPhil in Oxford under the supervision of Roger Heath-Brown, completed in 2013. He was then a Fellow by Examination at Magdalen College, Oxford from 2013-17. He held a Clay Fellowship at Oxford before his promotion to professor in 2018. He has also held research and visiting positions at Montreal, Berkeley and at the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton. Since 2018 he has been a Professor of Number Theory at the University of Oxford, and a member of St John's College.
James is known for his influential work in analytic number theory, particularly on the distribution of prime numbers. He uses a blend of ideas from analysis, combinatorics and algebra to try to answer old questions in number theory. As a postdoctoral researcher he developed a new sieve method for detecting primes in bounded length intervals, and settled a long-standing conjecture of Paul Erdős on large gaps between primes. He then worked on Diophantine approximation, and in joint work with D. Koukoulopoulos he settled the Duffin-Schaeffer conjecture and dramatically improved upon the work of Schmidt concerning simultaneous approximation by rationals with square denominator. He has published a series of works on the distribution of primes in residue classes which goes beyond what follows from the Generalised Riemann Hypothesis.
James has received numerous prizes for his work, including the Whitehead Prize from the London Mathematical Society in 2015, the European Mathematical Society Prize in 2016, the Cole Prize in Number Theory from the American Mathematical Society in 2020, and the prestigious Fields Medal from the International Mathematical Union in 2022 for his "contributions to analytic number theory, which have led to major advances in the understanding of the structure of prime numbers and in Diophantine approximation". He was elected to the Academia Europaea in 2020, as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2023 and as a founding Fellow of the Academy of Mathematical Sciences in 2026. James is an avid Arsenal supporter.