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Subcategories

• Algebraists
• Archimedes
• Aristotle
• Bohr, Harald August
• Calculus Pioneers
• Charles Babbage
• Descartes, René
• Erdös, Paul
• Euclid
• Euler, Leonhard
• Galileo Galilei
• Galois, Évariste
• Geometers
• Huygens, Christiaan
• Kepler, Johannes
• Logicians and Set Theorists
• Menger, Karl
• Napier, John
• Newton, Isaac
• Omar Khayyam
• Pythagoras of Samos
• Strauss, Josef
• Thales
• Zeno of Elea

Resources in This Category

• A Chonicle of Mathematical People

  http://www.robertnowlan.com/
  Robert A. Nowlan provides short biographical sketches of mathematicians from many diverse fields.

• Abel - Niels Henrik Abel (1802-1829)

  http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Mathematicians/Abel.html
  Norwegian mathematician. Worked on elliptic functions and integrals, algebraic solution of equations and solubility by radicals.

• Al-Sabi Thabit ibn Qurra al-Harrani

  http://www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Thabit.html
  Gives information on background and contributions to non-euclidean geometry, spherical trigonometry, number theory and the field of statics. Was an important translator of Greek materials, including Euclid's Elements, during the Middle Ages.

• Andrei Nikolaevich Kolmogorov (1903-1987)

  http://kolmogorov.com/Kolmogorov.html
  The most prominent twentieth-century mathematician.

• Bernoulli, Daniel (1700-1782)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Bernoulli_Daniel.html
  Most important work considered the basic properties of fluid flow, pressure, density and velocity, and gave their fundamental relationship now known as Bernoulli's principle.

• Bessel - Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel (1784-1846)

  http://www.astro.uni-bonn.de/~pbrosche/persons/pers_bessel.html
  Catalogued stars, predicted a planet beyond Uranus as well as the existence of dark stars, investigated Johann Kepler's problem of heliocentricity, and systematized the mathematical functions involved, which now bear his name.

• Biographies of Women Mathematicians

  http://www.agnesscott.edu/lriddle/women/women.htm
  On-going project by students in mathematics classes at Agnes Scott College, in Atlanta, Georgia.

• Cauchy - Augustin-Louis Cauchy (1789-1857)

  http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03457a.htm
  (Catholic Encyclopedia) Theory of polyhedra, symmetrical functions, proof of a theorem of Fermat which had baffled mathematicians like Gauss and Euler.

• Cauchy, Augustin Louis (1789-1857)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Cauchy.html
  Cauchy contributed to almost every branch of mathematics. He is probably best known for his important contributions to real and complex analysis.

• Chebyshev - Pafnuty Lvovich Chebyshev (1821-1894)

  http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Chebyshev.html
  Work on prime numbers included the determination of the number of primes not exceeding a given number, wrote an important book on the theory of congruences, proved that there was always at least one prime between n and 2n for n > 3.

• Cramer - Gabriel Cramer (1704-1752)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Cramer.html
  Best known for his work on determinants, made contributions to the study of algebraic curves.

• d'Alembert - Jean Le Rond d'Alembert (1717-1783)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/D'Alembert.html
  Helped to resolve the controversy in mathematical physics over the conservation of kinetic energy by improving Newton's definition of force.

• Diophantus of Alexandria (c. 200-284 )

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Diophantus.html
  Best known for his Arithmetica, a work on the theory of numbers, a collection of 130 problems giving numerical solutions of determinate equations.

• Dirichlet - Johann Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet (1805-1859)

  http://turnbull.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Dirichlet.html
  Proved that in any arithmetic progression with first term coprime to the difference there are infinitely many primes, units in algebraic number theory, ideals, proposed the modern definition of a function.

• Eratosthenes of Cyrene

  http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Eratosthenes.html
  Biography of the mathematician, geographer and astronomer born 276 BC in Cyrene, North Africa. From The MacTutor History of Mathematics archive.

• Eratosthenes of Cyrene (276-194 BC)

  http://www.eranet.gr/eratosthenes/html/eoc.html
  Discusses this early Grecian's discoveries in finding a good approximation of the circumference of the earth, the tilt angle of our planet and a tool for finding prime numbers. Page includes biographical information.

• Eratosthenes: The Measurement of the Earth's Circumference

  http://www.juliantrubin.com/bigten/eratosthenes.html
  Gives information about the techniques and computations used by this ancient mathematician to find the circumference of the earth. Includes sample sketch and reconstructed map of the world.

• Fermat - Pierre de Fermat (1601-1665)

  http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/People/Fermat/RouseBall/RB_Fermat.html
  From `A Short Account of the History of Mathematics' (4th edition, 1908) by W. W. Rouse Ball.

• Fibonacci - Who was Fibonacci? - Leonardo of Pisa (1175?-1250)

  http://www.mcs.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/R.Knott/Fibonacci/fibBio.html
  His names, mathematical contributions, Introducing the decimal number system into Europe, Fibonacci Series.

• Fibonacci Mathematics by Dr. Peter Reimers

  http://www.fibonacci-mathematics.de/
  Describes the rabbit problem and the Fibonacci sequence and some generalized rules.

• Gauss, Johann Carl Friedrich (1777-1855)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Gauss.html
  One of the all-time greats, Gauss began to show his mathematical brilliance at the early age of seven. He is usually credited with the first proof of The Fundamental Theorem of Algebra.

• Hermann Gunter Grassmann

  http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Grassmann.html
  Provides biographical details of this German mathematician who lived from 1809 to 1877, the inventor of what is now called exterior algebra.

• History of Mathematics

  http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/HistMath.html
  Online texts of historic mathematical people, including Hamilton, Riemann, Newton, Boole, and Cantor. Also, has biographical backgrounds for key figures during the 17th and 18th centuries.

• Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777-1855)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Biographies/Gauss.html
  Article by J J O'Connor and E F Robertson giving biographical details of the great mathematician, with a number of photographs.

• Julius Wilhelm Richard Dedekind

  http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Dedekind.html
  Provides biographical details of this German mathematician who lived from 1831 to 1916.

• Kolmogorov, Andrei Nikolaevich (1903-1987)

  http://homepages.cwi.nl/~paulv/KOLMOGOROV.BIOGRAPHY.html
  Worked on trigonometric series, set theory, integration analysis, constructive logic, topology, approximation methods, probability, statistics, random processes, information theory, dynamical systems, algorithms, celestial mechanics, Hilbert's 13th problem, and ballistics. Also, studied and applications of mathematics to problems of biology, geology, linguistics and the crystallization of metals. Born and lived in Russia.

• Lambert - Johann Heinrich Lambert (1728 - 1777)

  http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/People/Lambert/RouseBall/RB_Lambert.html
  In a memoir in 1768 on transcendental magnitudes he proved that pi is incommensurable.

• Oughtred, William (1574-1660)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Oughtred.html
  Best known for the invention of an early form of the slide rule.

• Peirce, Benjamin (1809-1880)

  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/peirce-benjamin/
  Life and work of 19th century mathematician and philosopher of mathematics; by Ivor Grattan-Guinness and Alison Walsh.

• Pell, John (1611-1685)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Pell.html
  Worked on algebra and number theory, gave a table of factors of all integers up to 100000 in 1668. Pell's equation is y^2 = ax^2 + 1, where a is a non-square integer.

• Plato (427-347 B.C.)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Plato.html
  "... the reality which scientific thought is seeking must be expressible in mathematical terms, mathematics being the most precise and definite kind of thinking of which we are capable."

• Schmidt, Erhard (1876-1959)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Schmidt.html
  Main research was functional analysis, doctorate was obtained under Hilbert's supervision, main interest was in integral equations and Hilbert space, best remembered for the Gram-Schmidt orthogonalisation process.

• Sheynin, Oscar

  http://www.sheynin.de/
  Freelance researcher specializes in the history of probability, statistics and error theory. Page includes list of publications and outside reviews.

• Shortest path to Gauss

  http://www.gauss.info/
  This site is the quickest access to information about C.F.Gauss, although reduced to a single page.

• Srinivasa Ramanujan

  http://ramanujan.sirinudi.org/
  Published and unpublished works. HTML, PDF and DjVu formats.

• The Grothendieck Biography Project

  http://www.fermentmagazine.org/home5.html
  Links relating to Alexandre Groethendieck.

• The Grothendieck Circle

  http://people.math.jussieu.fr/~leila/grothendieckcircle/
  Aims to make publicly available materials written by and about Alexandre Grothendieck. Made contributions to algebraic geometry, homological algebra and functional analysis. Page includes list of mathematical,biographical publications and some portrait photos.

• The History of Mathematics

  http://www.maths.tcd.ie/pub/HistMath/
  Collection of original papers of Berkeley, Hamilton, Riemann, Boole, Cantor, and Newton. Includes background and notes. Maintained by David R. Wilkins from Trinity College, Dublin

• University of St. Andrews: Biography Index

  http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/BiogIndex.html
  Names are listed alphabetically or by date, from 1680 BC to the present.

• Zermelo - Ernst Friedrich Ferdinand Zermelo (1871-1953)

  http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Zermelo.html
  Zermelo in 1908 was the first to attempt an axiomatisation of set theory

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