A decade later, theoretical physicist Edward Witten and others would discover that Chern-Simons theory had applications to a range of areas in physics, including condensed matter, string theory, and supergravity. It even became crucial to methods used by Microsoft and others in their attempts to develop quantum computers capable of solving problems vexing modern computers, such as drug development and artificial intelligence. By 2019, tens of thousands of citations in academic papers—approximately three a day—referenced Chern-Simons theory, cementing Simons’s position in the upper echelon of
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