- DARPA-funded research investigates how artificial intelligence can accelerate breakthroughs in mathematics research.
- Researchers at the University of California, Irvine and the University of Southern California will study AI tools in real-world research environments while collaborating with expert mathematicians on unsolved problems.
- The $2.6 million, three-year grant will support a first-of-its-kind effort to measure the impact of AI on mathematical discovery, not just problem-solving accuracy.
Irvine, California, May 18, 2025 — Researchers at the University of California, Irvine and the University of Southern California have received a three-year, $2.6 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to study how artificial intelligence tools can accelerate progress in advanced mathematics research.
The project, led by Jesse Wolfson, professor of mathematics at the University of California, Irvine, brings together Aravind Asoke, a professor of mathematics in the University of California, Dornsaif College of Letters, Arts and Sciences; Alexa McClain, a logic-philosophy researcher at the University of California, Irvine, investigates how emerging AI tools impact mathematical discoveries in areas such as number theory, partial differential equations, and computational complexity.
By looking at how research is being done at the forefront of mathematics, this study will help determine whether and how AI can accelerate breakthroughs and change the way mathematicians work.
“Understanding AI’s ability to accelerate mathematicians’ work will be different from giving it a problem with a known answer,” Wolfson said. “It’s whether it helps working mathematicians make progress on problems that haven’t been solved yet. That’s what we’re trying to measure.”
Unlike traditional evaluations that test AI on closed problem sets with known answers, this project investigates the impact of AI in an active research environment. The team will develop a framework to assess how these tools impact productivity for open problems related to current mathematics research. The researchers will convene a group of about 20 mathematicians to hold four-day workshops twice a year for three years. Small teams work on open issues in an environment overseen by the project team.
The project was selected for DARPA’s Power Mathematics Program, which aims to accelerate progress in pure mathematics by developing AI systems that can support advanced mathematical research.
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