Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe MADRID, Aug. 22 (UPI) -- A reclusive Russian mathematician refused to accept a prestigious Fields Medal, akin to a Nobel Prize in Madrid Tuesday, and chose to remain at home. Despite receiving a personal invitation to attend the International Mathematical Union's conference from King Juan Carlos of Spain, Grigory Perelman, 40, remained in St. Petersburg, The Times of London reported. Advertisement As well as rejecting the medal and acclaim, Perelman apparently is not interested in the $1 million prize that accompanies it, the report said. Perelman started working on the Poincare Conjecture, the math formula he is credited with proving, in 1992. He proved a theorem about the nature of multidimensional space that has stumped mathematicians and scientists for 100 years and helped define the shape of the universe. At the age 16, he won the top prize at the International Mathematical Olympiad in Budapest in 1982 with the top score, the newspaper said.
