Thom received in 2000 his Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics from the University of Cambridge. In 2003 he obtained his doctorate (Promotion) from the University of Münster with thesis advisor Joachim Cuntz and thesis Connective E-Theory and Bivariant Homology for C*-Algebra.[2] He was a Postdoc 2003–2005 at the University of Münster, and 2005–2007 at the University of Göttingen. From 2007 to 2009 he was a junior professor for Geometrical Aspects of Pure Mathematics at the University of Göttingen. After being promoted to assistant professor in Göttingen, he moved in 2009 to become a full professor for Theoretical Mathematics at the University of Leipzig. In 2014 he moved to a full professorship in geometry at TU Dresden.[3]
Awards and honors
In 2011, Thom received an ERC Starting Grant No. 277728 Geometry and Analysis of Group Rings.[4]
In 2016, he received an ERC Consolidator Grant No. 681207 Groups, Dynamics, and Approximation.[5]
In 2018, Thom was an invited speaker for a talk Finitary approximations of groups and their applications at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Rio de Janeiro.