Immigrant of the Day: Sylvia Nasar (Germany)

Sylvia Nasar (born 17 August 1947 in Rosenheim, Germany) is an German economist and author, best known for her biography of John Forbes Nash, A Beautiful Mind.

Nasar was born in Germany to a German mother and Uzbek father. Her family immigrated to the United States in 1951 and moved to Turkey in 1960. She graduated from Antioch College, and earned a masters’ degree in economics at New York University in 1976.

For four years, Nasar did research with Nobel Laureate Wassily Leontief. She is currently the Knight Chair in Business Journalism at Columbia University.

In the August 28, 2006 The New Yorker, Nasar’s article “Manifold Destiny” contained the only interview with Grigori Perelman, who solved the Poincaré conjecture, but rejected the 2006 Fields Medal.

KJ