Lecture Hall, University of Oxford.

The audience was crowded and full.

The scholars seated at the table exchanged ideas in small voices, or flipped through the papers and minutes of the presentations in their hands......

Those chaotic and noisy sounds, like a beautiful piece of music, are so pleasant to listen to the ears of Professor Brian Caro. In half an hour, he will become one of the greatest mathematical physicists of the century, laying the last brick on the edifice of the millennial puzzle of the Young Mills equation and sharing a million dollars...... At least one-third of the portions.

For scholars doing theoretical work, this bonus is already quite expensive.

Of course, his motivation for solving this problem was not a bonus, at least in his opinion, money and honor were incidental.

How so?

Pushing civilization forward with your own hands is a pleasure in itself.

There are fifteen minutes left before the report meeting, and the participating scholars have basically arrived, and they probably won't come if they haven't appeared. The security guards standing at the door of the lecture hall opened the barrier and began to selectively let some master's, doctoral, and postdoctoral scholars who were waiting outside the lecture hall and did not receive invitations.

Standing in the corridor next to the venue, Professor Brian, dressed in a black suit, glanced at his watch, and then cast his gaze in the direction of the venue, and couldn't help but have a trace of disappointment in his eyes.

At this time, a waiter in a black suit with a bow tie at the collar walked over.

With a move in his heart, Professor Brian immediately looked at the waiter and asked.

"Is Professor Lu here?"

The receptionist was slightly stunned, then shook his head and said, "No." ”

Hearing that Lu Zhou didn't come, the disappointment in Professor Brian's eyes became even stronger.

But that's about it.

Although it is a pity that Professor Lu did not appear here, there are not a few people who come to listen to this report. Regardless of whether Professor Lu is optimistic about his research or not, his presentation will continue as always.

Fifteen minutes passed, and the presentation began.

Walking to the stage, Brian showed his PPT on the curtain, and began to elaborate his ideas for studying the quality gap problem from the abstract part of the paper, as well as some of the methods used in the proof.

Sitting in the audience, Luo Wenxuan took a deep breath and spread the notebook on his lap.

It is a list of several problems that he found while working on the Young Mills equation and Professor Brian's paper, and it would be best if they could be answered in the presentation. If he can't, he will point it out in the question session.

On the other side, Peter Goddard and Edward Witten from Princeton sat together.

Both of them are experts in the field of mathematical physics, and they are mainly engaged in the research of string theory. When they heard that the Oxford professor had claimed to have solved the quality gap problem, the two men who happened to be visiting CERN immediately hit it off and flew to the UK.

Listening to Professor Brian's speech on the stage, Dean Goddard suddenly sighed with some regret.

"It would be nice if Professor Lu was here."

As the director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, when Lu Zhou submitted his resignation to him, he tried to retain the promising scholar, but unfortunately it was not successful. No matter how many times he thinks about it, he will inevitably feel some regrets.

"He's got his problems, too," Witten laughed and crossed his legs, resting his notebook on his lap, "and whether he's here or not, I'm sure as an expert in the field will not miss this presentation." ”

Goddard: "What do you think of Professor Brian's paper?" ”

Witten thought for a moment and said, "I need to think about it for a while, after all, he has revised it at least ten times since the preprint was released, and I didn't see the final official version until a week ago." To be sure, there was something commendable about his proof ideas, but I always felt that something was wrong. If Mathematical Physics were to invite me as a reviewer, I would have included my views in the reviewers...... What do you think? ”

Before the start of the presentation, Professor Bryan had publicly stated that he would submit the final paper to Mathematical Physics. If nothing else, for such a major proposition, Mathematical Physics will organize a jury of at least five or more people to conduct the most rigorous review of the paper.

As a top Fields Medalist, Mathematical Physics obviously won't miss his name.

Of course, Peter Goddard, who sat next to him, was the same.

Dean Goddard was silent for a moment in response to Professor Witten's question, and then spoke.

"I feel similar to you, and his proof may be flawed...... And, I have another opinion on this issue? ”

Witten raised his eyebrows: "Oh? ”

Goddard dotted four dots in his notebook with a ballpoint pen and drew two lines casually: "A four-dimensional gauge field theory with SU(N) or SO(N) and SP(N) as canonical groups might be equivalent to a string theory with 1/n as the string coupling constant...... If this is the case, both the mass gap and the quark confinement phenomenon can be perfectly explained. ”

Witten raised his eyebrows with interest: "From the point of view of string theory? ”

Goddard looked sideways at him and nodded, "Exactly." ”

Witten smiled and said, "Your point of view has successfully piqued my interest, maybe when the report is over, we can go to a nearby café for a drink together." ”

Goddard smiled and said, "Haha, if you invite me." ”

When exchanging this new line of proof, the two were unaware, and in their hearts they had lost any hope for this report.

Two hours passed, and the presentation came to an end.

As Professor Bryan finished the last page of his presentation, the lecture hall burst into applause, and the whole presentation entered the question session.

Because he had made sufficient preparations, Professor Brian answered all the questions from the scholars in the audience.

Soon, no one in the lecture hall had raised their hand.

Just as Professor Brian was about to announce the end of the presentation, a hand suddenly reached out.

"Wait a minute."

Looking at the lone right hand in the crowd, Professor Brian frowned slightly, but quickly stretched his brow and said with a pleasant face.

"What's the matter?"

Taking a deep breath, Luo Wenxuan closed the notebook in his hand and stood up.

Sitting on the other side of the lecture hall, looking at the man who stood up, a touch of surprise suddenly appeared on Witten's face.

Noticing this surprised expression, Goddard cast an inquiring glance at him: "You know?" ”

Staring at Luo Wenxuan who stood up with interest, Witten smiled and said, "Of course, he is my student. ”

Although he has attended the report meeting no less than 20 times, Luo Wenxuan still feels a lot of pressure after being stared at by so many well-known scholars.

Calming himself down, he looked at Professor Brian on the stage and spoke.

"I have questions."

Brian: "Please. ”

Luo Wenxuan: "On page 11, line 15, I noticed that in your paper, you used the method of defining the canonical invariant effect in torus Euclid space-time...... Is that right? ”

Brian lifted his chin: "Of course, if we are going to discuss this issue from the formalization of the lattice point, this step is crucial to the whole argument process. ”

"As you said, this step is crucial, but ......," Luo Wenxuan took a deep breath and continued, "but how are you going to prove that the lattice step size is approaching the zero limit?" ”