Émile Clément Cotton (5 February 1872 – 14 March 1950) was a professor of mathematics at the

University of Grenoble The (, ''Grenoble Alps University'', abbr. UGA) is a Grands établissements, ''grand établissement'' in Grenoble, France. Founded in 1339, it is the third largest university in France with about 60,000 students and over 3,000 researchers. Es ...

. His PhD thesis studied

differential geometry Differential geometry is a Mathematics, mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of Calculus, single variable calculus, vector calculus, lin ...

in three dimensions, with the introduction of the

Cotton tensor In differential geometry, the Cotton tensor on a (pseudo)-Riemannian manifold of dimension ''n'' is a third-order tensor concomitant of the metric. The vanishing of the Cotton tensor for is necessary and sufficient condition for the manifold to ...

. He held the professorship from 1904 until his 1942 retirement. He was awarded the

Legion of Honor The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and civil. Currently consisting of five classes, it was ...

. His brother was

Aimé Cotton Aimé Auguste Cotton (9 October 1869 – 16 April 1951) was a French physicist known for his studies of the interaction of light with chiral molecules. In the absorption bands of these molecules, he discovered large values of optical rotato ...

; their father was a mathematics professor.

Publications

* ''Cours de mécanique générale. Introduction à l'étude de la mécanique industrielle'' (1920) University of Pennsylvania website, Online Books section, ''Cours de mécanique générale. Introduction à l'étude de la mécanique industrielle''
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References

Differential geometers French mathematicians 1872 births 1950 deaths {{mathematician-stub