Antonio Signorini (2 April 1888 – 23 February 1963) was an influential

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

mathematical physicist Mathematical physics refers to the development of mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The ''Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the developmen ...

and civil engineer of the 20th century.Signorini, Antonio — Treccani, Enciclopedie online
He is known for his work in finite elasticity, thermoelasticity and for formulating the

Signorini problem The Signorini problem is an elastostatics problem in linear elasticity: it consists in finding the elastic equilibrium configuration of an anisotropic non-homogeneous elastic body, resting on a rigid frictionless surface and subject only to ...

Life

Honors

He was awarded the gold medal of the

Accademia Nazionale delle Scienze detta dei XL The Accademia Nazionale delle Scienze (), or more formally L'Accademia Nazionale delle Scienze detta dei XL, and also called the Accademia dei XL (), is Italy's national academy of science. Its offices are located within the Villino Rosso, at the co ...

in 1920, while he was working at the

University of Palermo The University of Palermo ( it, Università degli Studi di Palermo) is a university located in Palermo, Italy, and founded in 1806. It is organized in 12 Faculties. History The University of Palermo was officially founded in 1806, although its ...

: the members of the judging commission were

Luigi Bianchi Luigi Bianchi (18 January 1856 – 6 June 1928) was an Italian mathematician. He was born in Parma, Emilia-Romagna, and died in Pisa. He was a leading member of the vigorous geometric school which flourished in Italy during the later years of th ...

Guido Castelnuovo Guido Castelnuovo (14 August 1865 – 27 April 1952) was an Italian mathematician. He is best known for his contributions to the field of algebraic geometry, though his contributions to the study of statistics and probability theory are also sign ...

and

Tullio Levi-Civita Tullio Levi-Civita, (, ; 29 March 1873 – 29 December 1941) was an Italian mathematician, most famous for his work on absolute differential calculus (tensor calculus) and its applications to the theory of relativity, but who also made signific ...

. In 1924, on 8 June, he was elected ordinary non resident member of the mathematics division of the

Accademia Pontaniana The Accademia Pontaniana was the first academy in the modern sense, as a learned society for scholars and humanists and guided by a formal statute. Patronized by Alfonso V of Aragon, it was founded by the poet Antonio Beccadelli in Naples during ...

. On 30 May 1931 he was elected corresponding member of the Società Nazionale di Scienze, Lettere e Arti in Napoli: later on, precisely on 11 February 1933 and on 4 June 1949 he was elected, respectively, ordinary member and ordinary non resident member of the same academy. He was elected corresponding member of the

Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei The Accademia dei Lincei (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed", but anglicised as the Lincean Academy) is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rom ...

on July 15, 1935, and then national member on February 4, 1947. However, he was never awarded the royal prize of this academy, because he became a very early a member of it, thus losing the right to win a prize.

Work

Research activity

His scientific production includes more than 114 works, being papers, monographs and

textbook A textbook is a book containing a comprehensive compilation of content in a branch of study with the intention of explaining it. Textbooks are produced to meet the needs of educators, usually at educational institutions. Schoolbooks are textbook ...

s, 17 of which have been collected in his "Opere Scelte" (Selected works).

Teaching activity

Among his "allievi" there are some of the most important Italian

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

s and

s; a partial list of them is below: * Carlo Cattaneo * Ida Cattaneo Gasparini * Piero Giorgio Bordoni * Giuseppe Grioli * Giuseppe Tedone * Carlo Tolotti He was also a close friend and teacher of

Gaetano Fichera Gaetano Fichera (8 February 1922 – 1 June 1996) was an Italian mathematician, working in mathematical analysis, linear elasticity, partial differential equations and several complex variables. He was born in Acireale, and died in Rome. Biog ...

at the Istituto Nazionale di Alta Matematica, inspiring his research in continuum mechanics, his solution of the

and the creation of the field of

variational inequalities In mathematics, a variational inequality is an inequality involving a functional, which has to be solved for all possible values of a given variable, belonging usually to a convex set. The mathematical theory of variational inequalities was initi ...

.Forn more information, see the "''Signorini problem''" entry, or the historical paper .

Selected publications

*. An important work, summarizing Signorini's approach to continuum mechanics of finite strains. *. A volume collecting the most important works of Antonio Signorini with an introduction and a commentary of Giuseppe Grioli.

Notes

References

Biographical and general references

*. The "''Yearbook''" of the renowned Italian scientific institution, including an historical sketch of its history, the list of all past and present members as well as a wealth of information about its academic and scientific activities. *. The "Yearbook 2015" of the Accademia Pontaniana, published by the Academy itself and describing its past and present hierarchies and its activities. It also gives some notes on its history, the full list of its members and other useful information. *, available from th
Biblioteca Digitale Italiana di Matematica
* *. ''The birth of the theory of variational inequalities remembered thirty years later'' (English translation of the title) is an historical paper describing the beginning of the theory of variational inequalities from the point of view of its founder. *. * . This article, published in Signorinis's "''Selected works''" and whose English translation title is "''The work of Antonio Signorini in Mathematical Physics''" in the English translation, is an ample commentary on Signorini's work in

mathematical physics Mathematical physics refers to the development of mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The '' Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and the developme ...

written by one of his "allievi". *. The "''Commemoration of Antonio Signorini''" written by his colleague and close fiend Mauro Picone. *. The "''Yearbook''" of the renowned Italian scientific institution, including the list of all past and present members as well as a wealth of information about its academic and scientific activities.

Scientific references

*. *. *. *, . The encyclopedia entry about problems with unilateral constraints (the class of boundary value problems the Signorini problem belongs to) he wrote for the ''Handbuch der Physik'' on invitation by Clifford Truesdell. {{DEFAULTSORT:Signorini, Antonio 1888 births 1963 deaths 20th-century Italian mathematicians Italian civil engineers 20th-century Italian physicists Mathematical physicists People from Arezzo Sapienza University of Rome faculty University of Palermo alumni University of Palermo faculty