OpenAI says AI solved one of seven Millennium Prize Problems, sparking dispute with rival researchers

OpenAI says one of its artificial intelligence models solved the Navier-Stokes problem, a mathematical challenge that has resisted human researchers for generations. The claim immediately triggered a dispute with rival researchers over who developed the key approach.

The company said it used 88 hours and millions of dollars in computing power to address the problem. Navier-Stokes is one of seven Millennium Prize Problems identified by the Clay Mathematics Institute. The equations describe the movement of fluids such as air and water and are used in areas including aircraft design, weather forecasting and the study of blood flow.

OpenAI said its work showed that the equations can fail over time, answering the question as it was framed by the Millennium Prize. Mark Chen, OpenAI’s director of research, called the result “an important milestone for AI research” and said it suggested that AI might eventually answer some of the world’s hardest questions.

The model involved has not been released to the public. OpenAI said it began training a new model in late August and described it as more capable than any model it had previously made public. Each Millennium Prize Problem carries a $1 million award, but only one has been solved since the list was published in 2000. OpenAI said it would not claim the money if its result is confirmed.

The announcement came hours after New York University mathematician Tristan Buckmaster and Levent Alpoge of OpenAI rival Anthropic published AI-assisted work on three related equations. Buckmaster said OpenAI became interested only after news of their research spread and used the same unusual approach he and Alpoge had developed. OpenAI researchers denied accessing the rival team’s work and said they had offered to share credit.

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This is an important milestone for AI research, and the promise for the world is that our hardest questions could eventually be answered.