Top 8 Youngest Professors in the World Who Started Teaching at the Age of 18

Charles Homer Haskins was born in the 1870s in Meadville, Pennsylvania, USA. By the end of the 19th century, he had gained fame as a prodigy, fluent in both Latin and Greek by the age of 10. He completed his bachelor's degree at Johns Hopkins University at 16 and later earned his Ph.D. in Paris and Berlin. According to Johns Hopkins University's historical records, he began teaching there before the age of 20. In 1890, he was appointed as a lecturer at the University of Wisconsin, becoming a full professor just two years later, and from 1892 to 1902, he chaired the European History Department. In 1902, he moved to Harvard University, where he taught until 1931.

Throughout his career, Haskins mentored many students, including Lynn White, Gaines Post, and Carl Stephenson. His most famous student was medieval historian Joseph Strayer, who went on to teach medieval studies at Princeton University, influencing the next generation of medieval scholars.

Terence Tao, an Australian of Chinese descent, was born in 1975 and is currently a professor of Mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles. He holds the distinction of being the youngest professor ever appointed there, at just 24 years old. In 2006, he received both the Fields Medal and the MacArthur Fellowship, and in 2014, he was awarded the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics. That same year, he was recognized for his academic contributions since the age of nine.

At the age of 8, Tao became one of only two individuals to score over 700 points in the SAT Math section. He was also the youngest ever participant in the International Mathematical Olympiad, earning bronze, silver, and gold medals in 1986, 1987, and 1988, respectively. To this day, he holds the record for winning all three medals in the history of the Olympiad, achieving this feat just after turning 13.

Tao joined the Science Research Institute when he was 14 and published his first paper at the age of 15. He completed his bachelor's and master's degrees at 16 from Flinders University, and in 1992, he was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to pursue a Ph.D. in the U.S. He earned his doctorate at 21. Tao began teaching at UCLA in 1996, and at 24, he became a full-time professor, the youngest ever appointed to that position at the university.

Stephen Wolfram, born in 1959, was appointed as a professor at the California Institute of Technology at the age of 21, specializing in Physics, Mathematics, and Computer Science. Unlike other young professors, Stephen had been considered a poor student during his early schooling because he struggled with basic mathematics. The reason was simple—he found elementary math too easy and boring. His true passion for mathematics and physics emerged when he encountered advanced calculus and theoretical physics.

At just 14, Wolfram published three books on Particle Physics. By 15, he began researching Quantum Physics and published peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals. At 18, he enrolled at the California Institute of Technology, where he earned his bachelor's degree with honors at 21. The institution was so impressed with his achievements that they invited him to join their faculty. After a few years, he left Caltech and founded his own company, Wolfram Research Inc., which is best known for developing the powerful computational software Wolfram Mathematica.

Charles Fefferman is a renowned American mathematician currently teaching at Princeton University. He was awarded the Fields Medal in 1978 for his groundbreaking contributions to mathematical analysis. Born into a Jewish family in Washington, Fefferman was considered a child prodigy. He began his university studies at just 14 years old at the University of Maryland and published his first scientific paper at the age of 15. Two years later, he graduated with a degree in mathematics and physics and earned a Ph.D. in mathematics from Princeton three years after that, with a thesis titled 'Inequalities for Convolution Operators'. At the age of 22, he was appointed as a professor at the University of Chicago, making him the youngest professor ever in the United States at the time.

Fefferman won the Alan T. Waterman Award in 1976, becoming the first recipient of the prestigious honor, and went on to receive the Fields Medal in 1978 for his work in mathematical analysis. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1979 and became a Herbert Jones Professor at Princeton in 1984.

Murray Gell-Mann is an American physicist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1969. He served as the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology and was one of the co-founders of the Santa Fe Institute. Gell-Mann was also a professor of physics at the University of New Mexico.

At the age of 14, Gell-Mann enrolled at Yale University, where he completed his bachelor's degree in physics. He earned his Ph.D. from MIT at 22 and was appointed as a lecturer at Urbana-Champaign in 1952 and 1953. He joined Caltech in 1955, where he conducted research that earned him the Nobel Prize in 1969 for his work on elementary particles and his contributions to naming atomic particles. He was also appointed associate professor at Columbia University and at the University of Chicago from 1954 to 1955, before moving to Caltech, where he continued teaching until his retirement in 1993.

Alia Sabur holds the Guinness World Record as the youngest professor ever at the age of 18. Born on February 22, 1989, in New York, she made history by becoming a professor at Konkuk University in South Korea just days before turning 19. This achievement secured her place as the youngest professor in the world, a title she still holds.

In addition to this record, Alia Sabur graduated from Stony Brook University at the age of 14 with a degree in applied mathematics, making her the 6th youngest college graduate in the world. She earned her master's degree in materials science and engineering from Drexel University at 17. However, Sabur only taught for a year at Konkuk University before returning to the U.S. to work at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), where she took on the role of an intellectual property attorney.

Apart from her academic accomplishments, Alia has a strong passion for music and martial arts. She holds a black belt in Taekwondo and plays the clarinet with the New York Youth Symphony.

Before Alia Sabur, Colin Maclaurin held the record as the youngest professor until March 2008. Born in 1698 in Kilmodan, Argyll, Scotland, he was appointed as a professor at the University of Aberdeen in 1717 at just 19 years old, teaching mathematics.

Maclaurin was a mathematical prodigy, having entered university at the age of 11. He excelled in a 10-day long advanced mathematics examination, finishing at the top of his class. He earned his master's degree at 14 with a thesis on the strength of forces, and later stayed in Glasgow to study theology until he turned 19. By the age of 21, he met the famous physicist Isaac Newton, who invited him to teach at the University of Edinburgh. In 1725, he was appointed as the assistant professor of mathematics at the University of Edinburgh. Maclaurin made significant contributions to mathematics, including his work on the gravitational force of ellipsoids and the theory that a flattened sphere is a stable equilibrium state in Newton's gravitational theory.

In many countries, university faculty members are simply referred to as professors. One of the youngest professors in the world is Erik Demaine, known as the youngest professor in the history of MIT. Born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, he is the son of sculptor Martin L. Demaine and Judy Anderson. Recognized as a prodigy from the age of 7, Erik was homeschooled by his father and traveled extensively across North America. At just 12 years old, he enrolled in university.

Erik completed his bachelor's degree at the age of 14 at Dalhousie University in Canada. Six years later, he earned a PhD from the University of Waterloo, where his dissertation earned him the prestigious Canada Governor General’s Gold Medal and the NSERC Doctoral Prize for the best thesis in Canada.

He began his teaching career as a teaching assistant at MIT in 2001, and by 2011, he was appointed a full professor. To this day, Erik Demaine remains a distinguished member of MIT’s faculty, and his name is forever etched in the university’s history as its youngest-ever professor.