Code-breaker Turing will be face on UK currency

Code-breaker and father of artificial intelligence Alan Turing will be the face of the U.K.’S new polymer 50-pound ($63) note.

The mathematician was chosen from almost 1,000 eligible nominations from the field of science suggested by the public, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney said Monday in Manchester.

“Alan Turing was an outstanding mathematician whose work has had an enormous impact on how we live today,” Carney said. “Turing is a giant on whose shoulders so many now stand.”

Other names on the shortlist for the note included Stephen Hawking, Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, and Mary Anning.

Turing — played by Benedict Cumberbatch in a 2014 movie about his life — was also famed as a World War II code-breaker whose work was widely credited with hastening the end of the war and saving thousands of lives. But at the time, his achievements were overshadowed following his conviction of engaging in homosexual activity — then a criminal offense in Britain.

Turing also helped develop the first computers, and his work on the question of whether computers can think laid the foundations for AI.

The currency decision follows a campaign for more diversity on the U.K. currency. Turing, who was convicted for gross indecency for his relationship with a man and eventually killed himself, was pardoned posthumously in 2013.

The new polymer note, Britain’s highest denomination in circulation, is set for release by the end of 2021, and the concept design featured a photograph of Turing taken in 1951. A table and mathematical formula from his academic work, a picture of an early digital computer and a quote from Turing are included.