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Friedrich Hirzebruch
Friedrich Hirzebruch | |
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 Friedrich Hirzebruch in 1980 (picture courtesy MFO) | |
| Born | Friedrich Ernst Peter Hirzebruch (1927-10-17)17 October 1927 Hamm, Province of Westphalia, Weimar Germany |
| Died | 27 May 2012(2012-05-27) (aged 84) Bonn, Germany |
| Residence | Germany |
| Nationality | German |
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| Known for |
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| Awards |
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| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Mathematics |
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Friedrich Ernst Peter Hirzebruch ForMemRS[1] (17 October 1927 – 27 May 2012) was a German mathematician, working in the fields of topology, complex manifolds and algebraic geometry, and a leading figure in his generation. He has been described as "the most important mathematician in Germany of the postwar period."[3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]
Contents
1 Education
2 Career
3 Honours and awards
4 References
Education
Hirzebruch was born in Hamm, Westphalia in 1927.[12]
His father of the same name was a math teacher.
Hirzebruch studied at the University of Münster from 1945–1950, with one year at ETH Zürich.
Career
Hirzebruch then held a position at Erlangen, followed by the years 1952–54 at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. After one year at Princeton University 1955–56, he was made a professor at the University of Bonn, where he remained, becoming director of the Max-Planck-Institut für Mathematik in 1981.
More than 300 people gathered in celebration of his 80th birthday in Bonn in 2007.
The Hirzebruch–Riemann–Roch theorem (1954) for complex manifolds was a major advance and quickly became part of the mainstream developments around the classical Riemann–Roch theorem;
it was also a precursor of the Atiyah–Singer index theorem.
Hirzebruch's book Neue topologische Methoden in der algebraischen Geometrie (1956) was a basic text for the 'new methods' of sheaf theory, in complex algebraic geometry.
He went on to write the foundational papers on topological K-theory with Michael Atiyah, and collaborate with Armand Borel on the theory of characteristic classes. In his later work he provided a detailed theory of Hilbert modular surfaces, working with Don Zagier.
In March 1945, Hirzebruch became a soldier, and in April, in the last weeks of Hitler's rule, he was taken prisoner by the British forces then invading Germany from the west. When a British soldier found that he was studying mathematics, he drove him home and released him, and told him to continue studying.[1]
Hirzebruch died at the age of 84 on 27 May 2012.[13][14][15]
Honours and awards
Amongst many other honours, Hirzebruch was awarded a Wolf Prize in Mathematics in 1988 and a Lobachevsky Medal in 1989.[16]
The government of Japan awarded him the Order of the Sacred Treasure in 1996.[17]
Hirzebruch won an Einstein Medal in 1999, and received the Cantor medal in 2004.
Hirzebruch was a foreign member of numerous academies and societies, including the United States National Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society[1] and the French Academy of Sciences.
In 1980–81 he delivered the first Sackler Distinguished Lecture in Israel.
References
^ abc Atiyah, Michael (2014). "Friedrich Ernst Peter Hirzebruch 17 October 1927 — 27 May 2012". Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society. Royal Society. doi:10.1098/rsbm.2014.0010..mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"""""""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration{color:#555}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration span{border-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/12px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output code.cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#33aa33;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-right{padding-right:0.2em}
^ Friedrich Hirzebruch at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
^ "Friedrich Hirzebruch 1927-2012". 29 May 2012. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
^ Europa Publications (2003). The International Who's Who 2004. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-85743-217-6. Retrieved 24 April 2010.
^ Hirzebruch, Friedrich; Mayer, Karl Heinz (1968), O(n)-Mannigfaltigkeiten, Exotische Sphären und Singularitäten, Lecture Notes in Mathematics, 57, Berlin, New York: Springer-Verlag, doi:10.1007/BFb0074355, MR 0229251
^ Hirzebruch, Friedrich; Zagier, Don (1974), The Atiyah-Singer theorem and elementary number theory, Houston, TX: Publish or Perish, MR 0650832
^ Hirzebruch, Friedrich (1987), Gesammelte Abhandlungen. Band I, II, Berlin, New York: Springer-Verlag, ISBN 978-3-540-18087-6, MR 0931775
^ Hirzebruch, Friedrich; Jung, Rainer; Berger, Thomas (1992), Manifolds and modular forms, Aspects of Mathematics, E20, Braunschweig: Friedr. Vieweg & Sohn, ISBN 978-3-528-06414-3, MR 1189136
^ Hirzebruch, Friedrich (1995) [1956], Topological methods in algebraic geometry, Classics in Mathematics, Berlin, New York: Springer-Verlag, ISBN 978-3-540-58663-0, MR 1335917
^ Segel, Joel (2011-12-01). "Friedrich Hirzebruch: Giant of German Mathematics". Simons Foundation.
[permanent dead link]
^ Atiyah, Michael; Zagier, Don (2014), "Friedrich Hirzebruch (1927–2012)" (PDF), Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 61 (7): 706–727, doi:10.1090/noti1145
^ O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Friedrich Hirzebruch", MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews.
^ "With great sadness we mourn the death of our founder, Friedrich Hirzebruch, who passed away on Sunday, May 27". Max Planck Institute for Mathematics.
^ Max Planck Institute Announcement, Max Planck Institute for Mathematics. Retrieved on 29 May 2012.
^ "Friedrich Hirzebruch, Mathematician, Is Dead at 84"
^ Schecter, Bruce (June 10, 2012), "Friedrich Hirzebruch, Mathematician, Is Dead at 84", The New York Times
^ L'Harmattan web site (in French), Order with gold and silver rays
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