Chapter 41
On the evening the special documentary aired.
Our family sat side by side on the sofa and watched TV happily together.
On the screen, a cute shot of me looking cool appeared as I stood on the auditorium podium.
— Hello! I'm Yu A-yeon!
Arin jumped up from the sofa and pointed at the screen with her index finger.
"Sis! Sis, you're on TV!"
"Sit down, sit down."
Mom laughed and sat Arin back down on the sofa.
Dad also watched while patting my head.
"Uheheh."
I watched my image on the screen and kicked my feet back and forth.
Soon, the close-up feature on Yu A-yeon came on.
After TV had shown only things about me for a while, Arin jumped up again when her own back appeared.
"That's me! My back showed up!"
"Yeah. Arin showed up on TV too."
"Woohoo!"
Then Mom's interview scene came on.
"Mom looked super pretty!"
"Hehe, thanks."
Pat-pat-.
Mom showed off a strange new technique, patting both of us at once.
Dad chuckled softly beside us.
Finally, Professor Park Moo-yeol's interview scene appeared, and the broadcast ended.
Dad got up first and opened the refrigerator.
"Today's a family celebration party."
Dad took out a cake box.
And not a slice cake, but a whole cake...!
"Gasp...! That's a huge cake!"
"Wow! Dad's the best!"
Arin was so excited she threw her hands up in triumph.
Our family gathered around the table and munched happily on cake.
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Afterward.
Clips from Yu A-yeon's special documentary began spreading on MiTube.
Scenes of me giving lectures in front of professors, reading journals with Mom, showing off my IQ, and so on.
Every comment was full of reactions like 'Amazing.', 'She's a real genius.', 'So cute.', and 'That mom is amazing too.'
I borrowed Mom's laptop and read the comments on the videos.
"Heheh."
I felt great from all the praise.
Mom also laughed while watching it with me.
"A-yeon, does it feel good to get lots of praise?"
"Yep!"
By then, I started thinking.
Compliments from ordinary people like 'cute' and 'smart' were definitely nice.
"But I want to be praised a little more specifically...!"
Hah-!
I stretched straight up toward the sky and clenched my tiny fist tightly.
I wanted to hear from scholars exactly what was so impressive about the paper I had worked so hard on.
They were probably unofficially verifying my paper right now at universities all over the place. Maybe even holding seminars.
"I wonder if they'll hurry up and give me feedback already-. Huhuhi-huhuhi-hihihi-."
I grinned and kicked my feet in the air while looking forward to the scholars' feedback.
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Yu A-yeon gave a special lecture.
Not long after the special documentary was released worldwide.
Academia started unofficial verification of the paper.
The Riemann Hypothesis may look like a number theory problem about primes, but when you dig into it, it was a difficult problem with all sorts of fields mixed together.
Analytic number theory group, modular forms group, operator theory group, spectral geometry group, mathematical physics group, and so on.
Each mathematician began slowly verifying the parts that matched their field through seminars.
*
- Analytic number theory: studies primes, L-functions, zeta functions, and so on
- Modular forms: studies special functions with symmetry
- Operator theory: studies operators on Hilbert spaces
- Spectral geometry: studies the relationship between the geometric structure of space and the eigenvalues of operators
- Mathematical physics: studies the mathematical structures of physics, like random matrix theory and quantum chaotic systems. But surprisingly, it is deeply related to the Riemann Hypothesis.
*
Princeton University, Department of Mathematics, Analytic Number Theory Lab.
The professor printed out the paper and spread it on the seminar table.
Five graduate students sat around it.
"Today we'll verify section 3. It's the proof of the self-adjointness of operator H in the Hilbert-Pólya approach. Take turns reading and mark the parts you get stuck on."
The graduate students began reading the paper intently.
About ten minutes passed.
A doctoral student raised his hand.
"Professor, on page 37, the part about setting the operator's boundary conditions. I don't understand why the conditions have to be set this way."
The professor unfolded that page and read through it for a moment.
"I read this part twice too. For now, tell me your interpretation."
"Hmm... I think they deliberately fixed the boundary conditions so that a self-adjoint extension would be possible, in order to prevent the spectrum from spreading continuously."
The doctoral student explained.
The professor nodded, then stopped.
"I agree with that part too. But I'm still not convinced why the next step makes this condition sufficient."
The seminar room fell silent.
Everyone stared at the same page.
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Cambridge University, Department of Mathematics.
A seminar for modular-form researchers was being held.
Five researchers were dividing up the paper and reviewing specific sections.
"This part... I can follow the logic of the connection to the functional equation, but..."
Flap-.
A researcher flipped through the paper and said.
"There's a part in the middle where they use this estimate. I can't tell whether this is already a known result or something newly proven in this paper."
"Isn't it in the footnote?"
"I checked, and it's not there."
"Then shouldn't we ask the author?"
"Did the paper include an email address?"
Flap-.
Someone turned the paper cover over.
The email address of the second author, Han Seol-ae, was listed there.
"Here it is. The second author, Han Seol-ae, is the mother of the first author, Yu A-yeon, right? If we send it to this address, Yu A-yeon will read it too."
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ETH Zurich.
A professor specializing in operator theory was reading the paper alone in his lab.
Flap-.
It was already the third time.
He got stuck at the same part every time.
The claim that the spectrum of operator H corresponds to the zeros of the zeta function.
The way the paper chose to show that the correspondence was not just a formal similarity.
"This expansion of the trace formula..."
The professor muttered.
"It's right, but why did they choose this direction here? It just doesn't feel intuitive."
The professor sent a message to an overseas colleague.
"Did you read pages 58 through 62 of the paper? I keep getting stuck on this part."
Ten minutes later, a reply arrived.
"I got stuck there too. I talked with someone in Japan yesterday, and they were stuck on the same part."
"Hmm..."
The professor opened his laptop and typed in the email address listed in the paper.
"Seol-ae... Han..."
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Kyoto University's Research Institute for Mathematical Sciences.
The weekly spectral geometry seminar.
Tap-tap-.
The professor copied the formulas from the paper onto the blackboard and explained them.
The graduate students quickly took notes.
"How is it? Has everyone understood up to here?"
The graduate students nodded.
"Then the next part. It's the part showing that the spectral term really corresponds exactly to the zeros of the zeta function..."
The professor pointed at the blackboard.
A graduate student raised his hand.
"Professor, is it really certain that the operator has a discrete spectrum under these conditions? I can't quite wrap my head around it."
The professor checked that part too and tilted his head.
"Hmm... I'm not very sure either."
The professor said as he returned to his seat.
"I'll email the author. For things like this, it's faster to ask directly."
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And so.
Princeton, Stanford, Oxford, Cambridge, the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, Zurich, Bonn, Kyoto University, the University of Tokyo, Seoul National University, KAIST, and so on...
Question emails began flooding Han Seol-ae's inbox from research institutions all over the world.
The contents of the questions were different, but they all had one thing in common.
I want to understand the author's intent properly!
If the logic is sound, why is it sound?
Why did they choose this direction?
They wanted to hear it directly from the author.
Unread mail piled up in the inbox at a terrifying pace every day.
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"Heeeeeek...! So manyyyy..."
Boing!
One day, I suddenly opened Mom's inbox, got a shock, and sprang straight up on the spot. Like a cat that had seen a cucumber.
There were far more emails piled up than the last reporter's eager interview request.
Looks like broadcasting A-yeon's special lecture to the whole world had a huge effect.
Click. Click.
Mom said as she sorted the emails one by one.
"A-yeon, what are you going to do?"
"Of course I have to answer them all..."
But the problem was that the muscles in my little fingers still weren't developed enough, so typing was slow.
"Should Mom help?"
"Mm-hmm."
Shake-shake-.
I shook my head.
"Mom's been really tired lately, you know? She had to help with my lecture prep and film the documentary, too."
Her dark circles had already gotten pretty deep lately. So it's embarrassing to ask her to go through even more trouble...
"Recently, you've been busy too, A-yeon."
"No, no. If I sleep just once, my energy recharges! Yu A-yeon is totally full of pep! But Mom isn't, so... I want her to rest well..."
As a child of the New Nation, I'm an honorary citizen of Dreamland who sleeps more than 11 hours a day.
So when I wake up after sleeping, my battery is charged to 100 percent.
But an adult like Mom recovers energy slowly even after sleeping.
So now that all the important schedules are over, I want her to rest with peace of mind.
"Still... it feels bad for Mom to be the only one resting while A-yeon is working hard."
Mom looked apologetic.
"Mom, you're tired, right? I'll give you a scalp massage!"
Heave-ho-.
I stood up on the sofa and moved over next to Mom.
Yu A-yeon's special move: scalp knead-knead!
Press. Press.
I diligently pressed and kneaded Mom's scalp.
"Hehe, my daughter is so filial. I'll gladly take your massage, okay?"
Mom, receiving my massage, slowly closed her eyes.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
I also lightly tapped Mom's shoulder with my tiny fist.
Mom seemed to find my clumsy massage pleasant, and wore a relaxed expression.
"Phew-."
Before long, Mom's breathing began to slow.
Soft, even breathing-.
Mom finally started to fall asleep.
"Yes!"
I clenched my fist and cheered, of course under 30 decibels.
Tiptoe-tiptoe-.
I went quietly on tiptoe and gently covered the sleeping Mom on the sofa with a blanket decorated with cute animals.
Then I opened the emails on the laptop Mom had been using just moments ago.
"So how should I reply..."
Tap-tap-tap-.
I slowly began typing with my tiny fingers.