News from France, where the family of the late Alexandre Grothendieck, legend of basically all maths, have finally reached an agreement with the academic community about his huge archive of written notes. Discussions have been ongoing for a while but it’s finally been agreed that the notes can be released online for the community at large to take advantage of.

The notes comprise over 100,000 pages of mathematics, diagrams and letters to collaborators, and an initial chunk of over 18,000 pages will be online from 10th May on the University of Montpellier’s website. It’s expected that many undiscovered mathematical treasures might be found within, although the challenge of reading through and deciphering it all may take a Polymath-style mass effort.

More information

The notes of the mathematician Alexandre Grothendieck arrive on the net, at Libération (in French)

via Jordan Ellenberg on Twitter