1946-

Russian-born mathematician who received a 1978 Fields Medal for his work in combinatorics, ergodic theory, differential geometry, dynamical systems, and Lie groups. Lie groups, a branch of group theory, have algebraic structure and are subsets of space with discrete geometries. Some of these geometries resemble Euclidean space and thus can be studied by analytical techniques (e.g., differential equations). Margulis's work made Lie groups useful in applications of mathematics to science. In 1991 Margulis assumed a professorial chair at Yale University.