On the works of Avi Wigderson

This is an overview of some of the works of Avi Wigderson, 2021 Abel prize laureate. Wigderson’s contributions span many fields of computer science and mathematics. In this survey we focus on four subfields: cryptography, pseudorandomness, computational complexity lower bounds, and the theory of optimization over symmetric manifolds. Even within those fields, we are not able to mention all of Wigderson’s results, let alone cover them in full detail. However, we attempt to give a broad view of each field, as well as describe how Wigderson’s papers have answered central questions, made key definitions, forged unexpected connections, or otherwise made lasting changes to our ways of thinking in that field.