Georg Scheffers
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250px Georg Scheffers (21 November 1866 – 12 August 1945) was a German
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, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...
specializing in differential geometry.


Life

Scheffers was born on 21 November 1866 in the village of Altendorf near Holzminden (today incorporated into Holzminden). Scheffers began his university career at the
University of Leipzig Leipzig University (german: Universität Leipzig), in Leipzig in Saxony, Germany, is one of the world's oldest universities and the second-oldest university (by consecutive years of existence) in Germany. The university was founded on 2 Decemb ...
where he studied with
Felix Klein Christian Felix Klein (; 25 April 1849 – 22 June 1925) was a German mathematician and mathematics educator, known for his work with group theory, complex analysis, non-Euclidean geometry, and on the associations between geometry and grou ...
and
Sophus Lie Marius Sophus Lie ( ; ; 17 December 1842 – 18 February 1899) was a Norwegian mathematician. He largely created the theory of continuous symmetry and applied it to the study of geometry and differential equations. Life and career Marius Sophu ...
. Scheffers was a coauthor with Lie for three of the earliest expressions of
Lie theory In mathematics, the mathematician Sophus Lie ( ) initiated lines of study involving integration of differential equations, transformation groups, and contact of spheres that have come to be called Lie theory. For instance, the latter subject i ...
: * ''Lectures on
Differential equation In mathematics, a differential equation is an equation that relates one or more unknown functions and their derivatives. In applications, the functions generally represent physical quantities, the derivatives represent their rates of change, a ...
s with known
Infinitesimal transformation In mathematics, an infinitesimal transformation is a limiting form of ''small'' transformation. For example one may talk about an infinitesimal rotation of a rigid body, in three-dimensional space. This is conventionally represented by a 3×3 ...
s'' (1893), * ''Lectures on
Continuous group In mathematics, topological groups are logically the combination of groups and topological spaces, i.e. they are groups and topological spaces at the same time, such that the continuity condition for the group operations connects these two s ...
s'' (1893), and * ''Geometry of Contact Transformations'' (1896). All three are now available online through
archive.org The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music ...
. In 1896 Scheffers became
docent The title of docent is conferred by some European universities to denote a specific academic appointment within a set structure of academic ranks at or below the full professor rank, similar to a British readership, a French " ''maître de con ...
at the
Technical University of Darmstadt Technical may refer to: * Technical (vehicle), an improvised fighting vehicle * Technical analysis, a discipline for forecasting the future direction of prices through the study of past market data * Technical drawing, showing how something is co ...
, where he was raised to
professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professor ...
in 1900. From 1907 to 1935, when he retired, Scheffers was a professor at the
Technical University of Berlin The Technical University of Berlin (official name both in English and german: link=no, Technische Universität Berlin, also known as TU Berlin and Berlin Institute of Technology) is a public research university located in Berlin, Germany. It was ...
. In 1901–1902 he published a famous two-volume textbook entitled ''Anwendung der Differential- und Integralrechnung auf die Geometrie'' (application of differential and integral calculus to geometry). The first volume subtitled ''Einführung in die Theorie der Curven in der Ebene und in Raum'' was published in 1901 and dealt with
curve In mathematics, a curve (also called a curved line in older texts) is an object similar to a line, but that does not have to be straight. Intuitively, a curve may be thought of as the trace left by a moving point. This is the definition that ...
s. The second volume subtitled ''Einführung in die Theorie der Flächen'' (introduction to the theory of
surface A surface, as the term is most generally used, is the outermost or uppermost layer of a physical object or space. It is the portion or region of the object that can first be perceived by an observer using the senses of sight and touch, and is t ...
s) was published in 1902. A second edition was published in 1910 (volume 2, 1913), and a third edition in 1922. In 1907 Scheffers published the first two volumes of his extensive revision and rewriting of
Georg Bohlmann Georg Bohlmann (23 April 1869 – 25 April 1928) was a German mathematician who specialized in probability theory and actuarial mathematics. Life and career Georg Bohlmann went to school in Berlin and Leipzig and took his ''Abitur'' at t ...
's 1897–1899 revision of
Harnack Harnack is the surname of a German family of intellectuals, artists, mathematicians, scientists, theologians and those in other fields. Several family members were executed by the Nazis during the last years of the Third Reich. * Theodosius Harnac ...
's 1884 German translation of
Serret Serret is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: *Dulce María Serret (1898–1989), Cuban pianist and music teacher *Joseph Alfred Serret (1819–1885), French mathematician *Marie-Ernestine Serret (1812–1884), French painter and p ...
's famous two-volume ''Cours de calcul différentiel et intégral'', which was first published by Gauthier-Villars in 1868. In 1909 Scheffers published the third and last volume of his rewriting of Bohlman's version of Serret's two-volume work. For a new edition, Scheffers added an appendix with 46 pages of historical notes for the first and second volumes. Another very successful book was prepared for students of science and technology: ''Lehrbuch der Mathematik'' (textbook of mathematics). It provided an introduction to analytic geometry as well as
calculus Calculus, originally called infinitesimal calculus or "the calculus of infinitesimals", is the mathematics, mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizati ...
of
derivative In mathematics, the derivative of a function of a real variable measures the sensitivity to change of the function value (output value) with respect to a change in its argument (input value). Derivatives are a fundamental tool of calculus. ...
s and
integral In mathematics, an integral assigns numbers to functions in a way that describes displacement, area, volume, and other concepts that arise by combining infinitesimal data. The process of finding integrals is called integration. Along with ...
s. In 1958 this book was republished for the fourteenth time. Scheffers is known for an article on special transcendental curves (including W-curves) which appeared in the ''Enzyklopädie der mathematischen Wissenschaften'' in 1903: "Besondere transzendenten Kurven" (special transcendental curves). He wrote on translation surfaces for
Acta Mathematica ''Acta Mathematica'' is a peer-reviewed open-access scientific journal covering research in all fields of mathematics. According to Cédric Villani, this journal is "considered by many to be the most prestigious of all mathematical research jou ...
in 1904
"Das Abel'sche und das Lie'sche Theorem über Translationsflächen"
(the theorem of
Abel Abel ''Hábel''; ar, هابيل, Hābīl is a Biblical figure in the Book of Genesis within Abrahamic religions. He was the younger brother of Cain, and the younger son of Adam and Eve, the first couple in Biblical history. He was a shepherd ...
and
Lie A lie is an assertion that is believed to be false, typically used with the purpose of deception, deceiving or Deception, misleading someone. The practice of communicating lies is called lying. A person who communicates a lie may be termed a l ...
on translation surfaces). Other books written by Scheffers ar
''Lehrbuch der darstellenden Geometrie''
(textbook on descriptive geometry) (1919), ''Allerhand aus der zeichnenden Geometrie'' (1930), and ''Wie findet und zeichnet man Gradnetze von Land- und Sternkarten?'' (1934). Georg Scheffers died 12 August 1945, in
Berlin Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...
.


Hypercomplex numbers

In 1891 Georg Scheffers contributed his articl
"Zurückführung komplexer Zahlensysteme auf typische Formen"
to
Mathematische Annalen ''Mathematische Annalen'' (abbreviated as ''Math. Ann.'' or, formerly, ''Math. Annal.'') is a German mathematical research journal founded in 1868 by Alfred Clebsch and Carl Neumann. Subsequent managing editors were Felix Klein, David Hilbert, ...
(39:293–390). This article addressed a topic of considerable interest in the 1890s and contributed to the development of modern algebra. Scheffers distinguishes between a "Nichtquaternion system" (Nqss) and a Quaternion system (Qss). Scheffers characterizes the Qss as having three elements e_1,\ e_2,\ e_3 that satisfy (p 306) :e_1e_2-e_2e_1 = 2e_3, \quad e_2e_3-e_3e_2 = 2e_1, \quad e_3e_1-e_1e_3=2e_2. In today's language, Scheffers' Qss has the
quaternion In mathematics, the quaternion number system extends the complex numbers. Quaternions were first described by the Irish mathematician William Rowan Hamilton in 1843 and applied to mechanics in three-dimensional space. Hamilton defined a quat ...
algebra as a
subalgebra In mathematics, a subalgebra is a subset of an algebra, closed under all its operations, and carrying the induced operations. "Algebra", when referring to a structure, often means a vector space or module equipped with an additional bilinear oper ...
. Scheffers anticipates the concepts of
direct product In mathematics, one can often define a direct product of objects already known, giving a new one. This generalizes the Cartesian product of the underlying sets, together with a suitably defined structure on the product set. More abstractly, one t ...
of algebras and
direct sum of algebras In abstract algebra, the direct sum is a construction which combines several modules into a new, larger module. The direct sum of modules is the smallest module which contains the given modules as submodules with no "unnecessary" constraints, m ...
with his section (p 317) on reducibility, addition, and multiplication of systems. Thus Scheffers pioneered the structural approach to algebra. Though the article covers new ground with its exploration of Nqss, it is also a
literature review A literature review is an overview of the previously published works on a topic. The term can refer to a full scholarly paper or a section of a scholarly work such as a book, or an article. Either way, a literature review is supposed to provid ...
going back to the work of
Hermann Hankel Hermann Hankel (14 February 1839 – 29 August 1873) was a German mathematician. Having worked on mathematical analysis during his career, he is best known for introducing the Hankel transform and the Hankel matrix. Biography Hankel was born on ...
. In §14 (p 386) Scheffers reviews both German and English authors on hypercomplex numbers. In particular, he cites
Eduard Study Eduard Study ( ), more properly Christian Hugo Eduard Study (March 23, 1862 – January 6, 1930), was a German mathematician known for work on invariant theory of ternary forms (1889) and for the study of spherical trigonometry. He is also known ...
’s work of 1889. For volume 41 of ''Mathematische Annalen'' Scheffers contributed a further short note, this time including reference to 1867 work by
Edmond Laguerre Edmond Nicolas Laguerre (9 April 1834, Bar-le-Duc – 14 August 1886, Bar-le-Duc) was a French mathematician and a member of the Académie des sciences (1885). His main works were in the areas of geometry and complex analysis. He also investigate ...
on linear systems, a rich source of hypercomplex numbers.


See also

* Scheffers conditions


References

* Werner Burau (1975) "Georg Scheffers"
Dictionary of Scientific Biography The ''Dictionary of Scientific Biography'' is a scholarly reference work that was published from 1970 through 1980 by publisher Charles Scribner's Sons, with main editor the science historian Charles Gillispie, from Princeton University. It con ...
*
Georg Scheffers
at
Mathematics Genealogy Project The Mathematics Genealogy Project (MGP) is a web-based database for the academic genealogy of mathematicians.. By 31 December 2021, it contained information on 274,575 mathematical scientists who contributed to research-level mathematics. For a ty ...
.


External links

* 1891
''Vorlesungen über Differentialgleichungen mit bekannten infinitesimalen Transformationen''
from
archive.org The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music ...
** (lectures on
differential equation In mathematics, a differential equation is an equation that relates one or more unknown functions and their derivatives. In applications, the functions generally represent physical quantities, the derivatives represent their rates of change, a ...
s with known infinitesimal transformations) * 1893
''Vorlesungen über continuerliche Gruppen''
** (lectures on continuous groups), and * 1896
''Geometrie der Berührungstransformationen''
** (geometry of contact transformations) {{DEFAULTSORT:Scheffers, Georg 19th-century German mathematicians Differential geometers 1866 births 1945 deaths 20th-century German mathematicians People from Holzminden Academic staff of the Technical University of Berlin