Physical Sciences

I still remember very clearly the first time that I met Professor Iwasawa. It was in 1967 when he had just become a faculty member at Princeton University. I was a second year graduate student and had decided that I was ready to take the General Examination. Students were not told in advance which faculty members were to be on their examining committee. I had hoped that Professor Iwasawa would be on my committee and, on the day of the examination, when I was told that the committee was waiting for me in his office, I knew that my hope would be fulfilled. It was at that time that I first met him.

Historia Mathematica is the official journal of the ICHM. It publishes original research on the history of the mathematical sciences in all periods and cultures.
The goal of all activities of the ICHM is to promote history of mathematics as a scientific discipline. As a consequence:
the ICHM organizes scientific symposia, especially on the occasion of the International Congresses of the History of Science;
it publishes a World Directory of the historians of mathematics. A new edition is in press;
it awards the Kenneth O. May Medal to historians of mathematics for outstanding contributions to the history of mathematics, and that on the occasion of the International Congresses of the History of Science;
it is establishing a photo archive which will comprehend photographs of mathematicians to complement the collection already housed at the Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut in Oberwolfach, Germany;
an ICHM Dictionary on History of Mathematics edited by John Fauvel, England, continues to progress.

V.G Sprindzuk was a famous authority on the theory of Diophantine equations, Diophantine approximation and transcendental Number Theory. An alumnus of the Belorussian State University (1954-1959, where he was an undergraduate) and of the State University of Vilnius (1959-1962, where he undertook his postgraduate studies), he obtained his PhD in 1963, and his DSc degree in 1965. In 1969 he was made a full professor and a member of the Editorial Board of the Vesti of the Akademija Nauk BSSR (Mathematics). The following year he joined the Editorial Board of Acta Arithmetica, and in 1986 Prof. Sprindzuk became an Academician of the Belorussian Academy of Sciences.

The 1930s saw the flowering of a unique mathematical community at Princeton University with the construction of a luxurious new building Fine Hall (now Jones Hall) dedicated to the mathematician and Dean Harry Fine and designed to facilitate a real community of mathematicians engaged in research and closely linked with mathematical physicists in the attached Palmer physics laboratory to which it was connected and shared a joint math-physics library. This community was unlike any other in America before that time and perhaps afterwards, and had important consequences for American mathematics. With the planning and founding of the Institute for Advanced Study at the beginning of the decade, originally having only a mathematics department, which then shared Fine Hall with the university mathematics department as a single institute during the period 1933 to 1939, starting with three of the university's leading mathematicians joined by Einstein and Gödel and attracting many visitors, a very exciting environment developed which many students and faculty were loath to leave.

This brief history of the European Mathematical Society covers a period of slightly more than eight years, from the founding of the Society in 1990 to the end of 1998. The history was commissioned by the Society in order that an account could be composed before memories had faded, leaving only written records. Inevitably the many and changing participants in the activities to be described will have different views of these activities and their significance. The author has aimed to write an objective account - 'history' is really too grandiose a title - from the perspective of one who was present at, and involved in, all of the Council and Executive Committee meetings of the Society, with the exception of one meeting in Cracow. As is well known, proximity to events does not necessarily ensure freedom from prejudice in reporting - and so others must judge the degree of objectivity here achieved; notwithstanding the aim of impartiality, the author has allowed himself the liberty of an occasional subjective comment where it seemed to be particularly apposite.

The PRIME encyclopedia is designed to be browsed alphabetically. To begin, type up to six characters in the box at left and click “GO.” For example, to find the listing for “vector space” you would type “vector” in the box and then click the button. Use the “back/forth” buttons to move back and forth from your current location in the encyclopedia.
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This article will tell you about the history of Japanese Mechanical Calculating Machines, mainly those of manual type. A time table is also provided.
Through this article you will have the opportunity to see a typical example of the industrial life cycle including:
Beginning stage: An innovative engineer invents a new technology which starts a new industry.
Growing stage: Many companies get into the new industry under a patent license or after the patent expires. The market is expanded.
Saturation stage: The market becomes saturated, many companies disappear after being merged by larger companies or fail due to the hard competition. A few big companies control the market.
New beginning stage: An innovative engineer invents a new technology.
This life cycle is repeated in many type of industries. You can learn where is your business now within such cycle.

John Knopfmacher- A Mathematical Biography
Compiled by Doron Lubinsky
John Peter Louis Knopfmacher was born in Johannesburg in 1937. He
attended primary school at Yeoville Boy's School, and high school
at Athlone Boys' High. He majored in Mathematics and Applied
Mathematics in his B.Sc. at Witwatersrand University, scoring
firsts in both, followed by firsts in two successive honours
degrees in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics. In recognition of
his academic merit, he was awarded the Rusterholz Memorial Scholarship
for his M.Sc. and then the J.H. Hofmeyr Postgraduate Scholarship to
complete his Ph.D.

On the 25th of November 1993, Professor Dr. Hans-Egon Richert died in Blaustein near Ulm, Germany, after a long and severe illness. Richert held a chair of Mathematics at the University of Ulm from 1972 until his retirement as an emeritus professor in 1991.
Richert was born 1924 in Hamburg and was raised there. He had to complete high school at a private institution after being expelled from the public school in the period of the Third Reich for "anglophile leanings".
In 1946, at last back in Hamburg after the war and military service, he could begin his studies of mathematics. He obtained his diploma after eight terms and his PhD only one year later. When his mentor, Professor Max Deuring, accepted a position in Göttingen, the young Richert joined him as an assistant and obtained the venia legendi there in 1954. Soon after he was put in charge of one of the best mathematical libraries in Germany.

Leonhard Euler is considered by many to be the most prolific mathematician in history. He published 866 books and papers and won the Paris Academy Prize 12 times. He was born in Basel, Switzerland on April 15, 1707 and died on September 18, 1783. Euler was the son of a Lutheran minister and entered the University of Basel to study theology like his father but opted to change his major to mathematics under the advice of Johann Bernoulli. He worked at the St. Petersburg Academy of Science and later at the Berlin Academy of Science. In 1735, Euler lost sight in one eye, and in the late 1760's, he became completely blind. Although blind, Euler had such an incredible memory and mathematical mind, he was able to dictate treatises on algebra, optics, and lunar motion until his death. Francois Arago said of his mathematical talents, "He calculated just as men breathe, as eagles sustain themselves in the air." Once, Euler settled an argument between students whose calculation differed by a digit at the fifteenth decimal place by calculating the answer in his head. Euler's contributions to mathematics include the introduction of the symbols e, i, f(x), , and sigma for summations. He also made significant contributions to differential calculus, mathematical analysis, and number theory, as well as optics, mechanics, electricity, and magnetism.

Euler developed the function, which is defined as the number of positive integers not exceeding m that are relatively prime to m. For example, would equal:

> with(numtheory);

> phi(7);