Stephen Smale is an American mathematician from Flint, Michigan. His research concerns topology, dynamical systems and mathematical economics. He was awarded the Fields Medal in 1966, and spent more than three decades on the mathematics faculty of the University of California, Berkeley. He was born on July 15, 1930 in Flint, Michigan, United States. In 1960 Smale was appointed an associate professor of mathematics at the University of California, Berkeley, moving to a professorship at Columbia University the following year. In 1964 he returned to a professorship at UC Berkeley where he has spent the main part of his career. He retired from UC Berkeley in 1995 and took up a post as professor at the City University of Hong Kong. In 1996, he received the National Medal Of Science.