George Eyre Andrews (born December 4, 1938) is an American

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 ...

working in

special functions Special functions are particular mathematical functions that have more or less established names and notations due to their importance in mathematical analysis, functional analysis, geometry, physics, or other applications. The term is defined ...

number theory Number theory (or arithmetic or higher arithmetic in older usage) is a branch of pure mathematics devoted primarily to the study of the integers and integer-valued functions. German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855) said, "Math ...

analysis Analysis ( : analyses) is the process of breaking a complex topic or substance into smaller parts in order to gain a better understanding of it. The technique has been applied in the study of mathematics and logic since before Aristotle (3 ...

and

combinatorics Combinatorics is an area of mathematics primarily concerned with counting, both as a means and an end in obtaining results, and certain properties of finite structures. It is closely related to many other areas of mathematics and has many a ...

Education and career

He is currently an Evan Pugh Professor of Mathematics at

Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a public state-related land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvania. Founded in 1855 as the Farmers' High School of Pennsylvania, Penn State becam ...

. He did his undergraduate studies at

Oregon State University Oregon State University (OSU) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant, research university in Corvallis, Oregon. OSU offers more than 200 undergraduate-degree programs along with a variety of graduate and doctoral degree ...

and received his PhD in 1964 at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universit ...

where his advisor was

Hans Rademacher Hans Adolph Rademacher (; 3 April 1892, Wandsbeck, now Hamburg-Wandsbek – 7 February 1969, Haverford, Pennsylvania, USA) was a German-born American mathematician, known for work in mathematical analysis and number theory. Biography Rademacher ...

. During 2008–2009 he was president of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings ...

Contributions

Andrews's contributions include several monographs and over 250 research and popular articles on

q-series In mathematical area of combinatorics, the ''q''-Pochhammer symbol, also called the ''q''-shifted factorial, is the product (a;q)_n = \prod_^ (1-aq^k)=(1-a)(1-aq)(1-aq^2)\cdots(1-aq^), with (a;q)_0 = 1. It is a ''q''-analog of the Pochhammer sy ...

and applications. He is considered to be the world's leading expert in the theory of

integer partition In number theory and combinatorics, a partition of a positive integer , also called an integer partition, is a way of writing as a sum of positive integers. Two sums that differ only in the order of their summands are considered the same part ...

s. In 1976 he discovered Ramanujan's

Lost Notebook Ramanujan's lost notebook is the manuscript in which the Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan recorded the mathematical discoveries of the last year (1919–1920) of his life. Its whereabouts were unknown to all but a few mathematicians until i ...

. He is highly interested in mathematical pedagogy. His book ''The Theory of Partitions'' is the standard reference on the subject of

s. He has advanced mathematics in the theories of partitions and q-series. His work at the interface of number theory and combinatorics has also led to many important applications in physics.

Awards and honors

In 2003 Andrews was elected a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nat ...

.Inaugural Biography Article at the National Academy of Sciences
He was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, ...

in 1997. In 1998 he was an Invited Speaker at the

International Congress of Mathematicians The International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) is the largest conference for the topic of mathematics. It meets once every four years, hosted by the International Mathematical Union (IMU). The Fields Medals, the Nevanlinna Prize (to be rename ...

in Berlin. In 2012 he became a fellow of the

. He was given honorary doctorates from the

University of Parma The University of Parma ( it, Università degli Studi di Parma, UNIPR) is a public university in Parma, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. It is organised in nine departments. As of 2016 the University of Parma has about 26,000 students. History During the ...

in 1998, the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

in 2002, the

University of Waterloo The University of Waterloo (UWaterloo, UW, or Waterloo) is a public research university with a main campus in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is on of land adjacent to "Uptown" Waterloo and Waterloo Park. The university also operates ...

in 2004,

SASTRA University The Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy, also known as SASTRA, is a private and deemed university in the town of Thirumalaisamudram, Thanjavur district, Tamil Nadu, India. SASTRA is ranked by global ranking agencies such a ...

in Kumbakonam, India in 2012, and

University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Unive ...

in 2014

Publications

* ''Selected Works of George E Andrews (With Commentary)'' (World Scientific Publishing, 2012, )
''Number Theory''
(Dover, 1994, )

(Cambridge University Press, 1998, )
''Integer Partitions''
(with Eriksson, Kimmo) (Cambridge University Press, 2004, ) * ''Ramanujan's Lost Notebook: Part I'' (with

Bruce C. Berndt Bruce Carl Berndt (born March 13, 1939, in St. Joseph, Michigan, St. Joseph, Michigan) is an American mathematician. Berndt attended college at Albion College, graduating in 1961, where he also ran track. He received his master's and doctorate, d ...

) (Springer, 2005, ) * ''Ramanujan's Lost Notebook: Part II'', (with Bruce C. Berndt) (Springer, 2008, ) * ''Ramanujan's Lost Notebook: Part III'', (with Bruce C. Berndt) (Springer, 2012, ) * ''Ramanujan's Lost Notebook: Part IV'', (with Bruce C. Berndt) (Springer, 2013, ) * "Special functions" by George Andrews,

Richard Askey Richard Allen Askey (4 June 1933 – 9 October 2019) was an American mathematician, known for his expertise in the area of special functions. The Askey–Wilson polynomials (introduced by him in 1984 together with James A. Wilson) are on the to ...

, and Ranjan Roy, ''Encyclopedia of Mathematics and Its Applications'', The University Press, Cambridge, 1999.

References

External links

George Andrews's homepage
* * *
Author profile
in the database

zbMATH zbMATH Open, formerly Zentralblatt MATH, is a major reviewing service providing reviews and abstracts for articles in pure and applied mathematics, produced by the Berlin office of FIZ Karlsruhe – Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructur ...

"The Meaning of Ramanujan and His Lost Notebook" by George E. Andrews, Center for Advanced Study, U. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, YouTube, 2014

"Partitions, Dyson, and Ramanujan" - George Andrews, videosfromIAS, YouTube, 2016
{{DEFAULTSORT:Andrews, George 1938 births Living people Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Mathematical analysts Number theorists 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Oregon State University alumni University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences alumni Pennsylvania State University faculty People from Salem, Oregon Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Fellows of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics Additive combinatorialists Presidents of the American Mathematical Society Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Mathematicians from Oregon