Hannu Jaakko Rajaniemi was born March 9, 1978 in Ylivieska, Finland, ‘‘a small town of about 13,000 people not too far from the Arctic Circle.’’ He lived there until he was 19, then went to study theoretical physics and mathematics at the University of Oulu, graduating with a science BA. He studied math at Cambridge, then returned to Finland to do his national service as a research scientist for the