Problems / theoretical-computer-science
theoretical-computer-science / Algebraic complexity
The Matrix Multiplication Exponent
A record, not a resolution, and a small one by design. The bound moves from 2.371339 to 2.371177, about 1.6×10−4, and the authors describe it as a small step. Whether ω=2 is untouched, and nothing here suggests the laser method can reach it.
The interesting claim is methodological rather than numerical. The bottleneck in this line of work is a hard optimization problem, and the paper reports progress by reformulating that problem and then improving the optimizer, with AlphaEvolve doing the final refinement. That is a different kind of contribution from a new mathematical identity, and it is why the entry is filed as computation.