Cristian Popescu

Cristian Popescu is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), where he has been a faculty member since 2003. He previously held positions at Johns Hopkins University (2000-2003) and postdoctoral roles at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (Berkeley) and the University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on algebraic number theory and arithmetic geometry, particularly Iwasawa Theory, L-functions, and Drinfeld modules. He has organized numerous conferences, including the Iwasawa Congress (2010) and Stark's Conjectures workshops.

Education: Ph.D. in Mathematics from Ohio State University (1996), supervised by Karl Rubin. Postdoctoral mentors included Ken Ribet and John Tate.

Research interests span special values of L-functions, Fitting ideals, Galois module structure, and étale cohomology. Key contributions include proofs of the Equivariant Main Conjecture in Iwasawa Theory and advancements in the Equivariant Tamagawa Number Conjecture.

He has been recognized with awards such as the Simons Fellowship (2015-2016), the Simion Stoilow Prize (2005), and election as an AMS Fellow (2021). His work is funded by grants from the Simons Foundation and NSF.

Teaching includes advanced courses on algebraic number theory, abstract algebra, and calculus. Advised over 15 Ph.D. students, many now in academia. Active in mentoring postdoctoral researchers through programs like the SEW Assistant Professorships.

Leadership roles include organizing conferences on Iwasawa Theory and Stark conjectures. Collaborations with researchers like Cornelius Greither and Grzegorz Banaszak have produced foundational papers in the field. Current projects explore geometric main conjectures in function fields and applications to t-modules.