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John Nash, Subject of A Beautiful Mind, and Wife Killed in Taxi Accident

They were married nearly 60 years

liz-raftery.jpg
Liz Raftery

John Nash, the brilliant mathematician who was the subject of the 2002 film A Beautiful Mind, was killed in a taxi accident along with his wife Alicia on Saturday, NJ.com reports. Nash was 86 and his wife was 82.

The Nashes were passengers in a taxi whose driver lost control after he tried to pass another vehicle on the New Jersey Turnpike, police said. The taxi crashed into a guardrail and the Nashes, who did not appear to be wearing seatbelts, were ejected from the vehicle. The taxi driver suffered non-life-threatening injuries and the driver of the vehicle he was attempting to pass (which also crashed into the guardrail) was treated for neck pain.

See other celebrities we've lost this year

According to NJ.com, the couple was traveling back from the airport, having just returned from a trip to Norway, where Nash had received the Abel Prize for mathematics.

Nash was born in West Virginia and won the Nobel Prize for math in 1994. He joined Princeton University's math department the following year and did extensive research into game theory.

He was also a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, and his struggles with the illness were the main focus of A Beautiful Mind, which starred Russell Crowe as Nash.

Crowe, who was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for the role, shared condolences via Twitter Sunday.

The Nashes had been married for nearly 60 years.